Omega 3 EFAs also helped Ben's eczema. I personally think it's impossible to mask the taste of fish, so we use flaxseed oil, which is also an omega-3 essential fatty acid.

HI, my son also has very bad eczema to the point that his skin cracks!! I will try your remedy. Does the witch hazel burn? Thanks!
[This message has been edited by Riley (edited July 18, 2003).]

The witch hazel does not burn my son and it actually seems to cool off the skin. i also applied it to my very sunburned husband and he said that it really took the sting out.
Also, as far as the fish taste and smell of the supplements, i found one called Coromega that honestly tastes exactly like an orange creamsickle. there is absoutely no odor or fish taste. I have been astounded in the improvement i have seen in such a short time. In fact, we were at the allergy doctor yesterday and he couldn't believe how great his skin looked and felt. He has a really bad case of eczema.
i also had success with a product called Cutar which is made by summers laboratory. it is coal tar extract and you put it in the bath. it worked well for my son for awile, but after using it a year or so, it kind of stopped working as well for some reason.
[url="http://www.sumlab.com"]http://www.sumlab.com[/url]
one more thing that has worked in the bath is Johnson's foot soap found in the foot section of the drugstore.

MeCash,
I checked with my doctor about fish allergy, as my son is allergic to Shellfish.
This supplement has nothing to do with Shellfish. Shellfish are the most allergenic of the Fish family.
The chance of an allergic reaction to this supplement is slim as being allergic to coldwater fish is not common.

this is just my opinion and i'm NOT any expert or medical professional. my children all three (2 are allergic to peanuts) have terrible skin. sometimes their excema has actually gotten to the point where it has become infected and requires antibiotics. it does get better as they get older. it almost always occurred in the same spots when they were - under the backs of the knees, tops of their little fat feet (looked like hamburger meat), inside the bend of the arm, tops of their hands, etc.. as they get older it is more of a dry spot here and there on their bodies (usually their legs); less yucky but still itchy and troublesome. it gets worse in the summer months when they are hot. i think the red bumps on your child's mouth sound more like the little reactions my girls had to egg when they were younger. they have outgrown that allergy by now but it started out causing swollen lips and redness around the mouth when they were babies and then went to just little bumps and bits of redness around the mouth as toddlers before it finally just disappeared. maybe your child has some other allergies that you are unaware of. i don't remember excema ever being on my childrens' faces. not to say it couldn't happen though. joey

Quote:Originally posted by vegn67:
[b]Is exzema a rash, or something itchy? My dd gets small red spots around her mouth almost daily, but it's not itchy. Is this exzema? Does it only come from allergy?
Thanks,
Nancy[/b]
Eczema/Exzema is a rash and sometimes it's more itchy than red, sometime more rashy than itchy - my husband has no food or environmental allergies per say but I can't do any laundry in anything other than Ivory for him or his eczema goes wild. My daughter has eczema and adding more yogurt to her diet has kept it under control.
As for the small red dots around your daughter mouth - my daughter had those after every meal as a child (baby food from jars) and after allergy testing and removing the allergic food (melons, onion, oats, garlic, squash, bananas, apples, legumes from her diet, the red blotchy dots completely disappeared. These dots around the mouth appeared to be from an allergic reaction to something rather and they weren't eczema.
Warm regards,

My dd gets this too. She has a lot of food allergies and I think certain foods aggravate her mouth. It looks like clown mouth really. But she does scratch it sometimes esp. if she's eating something salty. So yeah, in her case, this is eczema. I would recommend the book: Eczema in Childhood by Atherton--borrow it from the library. It has tons of info about eczema and how to treat it. Good luck.

From my baby medical book...Eczema is a general term used to describe a number of different skin conditions. It usually appears as red skin that becomes moist and oozing, sometimes resulting in small, fluid-filled bumps. When it has persisted for some time, the skin tends to thicken, dry out, and become scaly. There are two types of eczema: atopic dermatitis and contact dermatitis.
Atopic dermatitis often occurs in people who have allergies or a family history of allergy or eczema. It usually occurs in 3 phases. The first phase is between 2 and 6 months of age, with itching, redness, and small bumps on the cheeks, forehead, and scalp. May spread to the arms or trunk. In half the cases, it disappears by 2 or 3 years of age. The 2nd phase occurs between 4 and 10 years..is circular, slightly raised, itchy and scaly eruptions on the face or trunk. Frequently occurs in the bends of the elbows, behind the knees, and the back of the wrists and ankles. This phase is very dry and itchy. The 3rd phase is areas of itching skin and a dry, scaly appearance at about age 12 and sometimes continues through adulthood.
Contact dermatitis occurs when the skin comes in contact with an irritating substance. Repeated contact with irrititants such as citrus juices, bubble baths, strong soaps, certain foods and medicines, and woolen or rough weave fabrics. One common irritant is a child's own saliva. It doesn't itch as much as atopic derm. and will usually go away when the irritant is removed. Contact derm. can be a result of skin contact to a substance that the child is allergic (i.e., flavorings, toothpaste, mouthwash..can cause a rash around the mouth), (glues/dyes in shoes can cause a rash on feet), (dyes in clothing can cause rash where clothing touches or where perspiration occurs), nickel jewelry, plants (poison ivy, poison oak, sumac, meds. such as neomycin ointment. These reactions usually develop a few hours after contact.
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Our dermatologist advises at the first sign of atopic derm. to get it under control. The more you itch, the worse the rash gets (skin infection) and it spreads. We have found bathing with Dove unscented soap (not the sensitive skin formula..it has almond oil in it!) and using Eucerin cream (not lotion)while the skin is still wet very effective in helping trap moisture in the skin. Dabbing a little of a prescribed ointment in severe areas also helps. I try to limit the usage of ointments with steriods. We loved Cetaphil products (bar soap, liquid soap-worked even better, and lotion-went on easier than creams) but they started adding sweet almond oil to their products which made my kids itch like crazy. Yes, I notified the company who claimed it wasn't possible for this to cause a reaction. I didn't realize they had changed their ingredients til the kids started begging me not to put it on them anymore! Because it burned/itched them! Sweating can also aggrevate eczema as well as emotional upsets (crying).
[This message has been edited by FromTheSouth (edited February 01, 2003).]

[url="http://www.fujisawa.com/books/books.htm"]http://www.fujisawa.com/books/books.htm[/url]
This is a link to a book, "Under My Skin" that was given to us by our dermatologist. It is availabe in its entirety on-line. Both of my children suffer from moderate to severe eczema. It helped us to really understand what was happening to their skin; they are literally itching from down inside their skin. When they itch, not only are they not doing any good because the itch is not on the surface where it can be reached by the fingernails, they are making it worse. Scratching triggers more little chemicals to invade the skin, which makes more itchies. Then of course, the end result is broken skin and many times, infection.
While I agree that summertime is hard for kids with this, I must say that winter is pretty bad too. The air is so dry and with any wind it just serves to dry the skin even more. We live for spring and fall around here! Just so they can get a little relief. But I am sure, depending on the climate where one lives, some may suffer at different times than others.
Good luck with finding out what this is and getting your child some relief! [img]http://uumor.pair.com/nutalle2/peanutallergy/smile.gif[/img]
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Little Man's Momma
a*k*a Kendra