Herbal Based Products

Eczema is a form dermatitis causing inflammation of the outermost layers of the skin. There are many types of eczema, which range from the mild to the persistent skin conditions. These can include dryness and recurring skin rashes, eczema symptoms are redness, skin swelling, itching blistering, dryness, flaking, crusting, and cracking skin, sometimes the skin becomes sore and will weep or bleed, it is often red and painful.

Eczema can often be found where the joints are in your body, for example the elbow or wrist or at the back of the knee. Where it affects babies is mostly on their faces, particularly the cheeks.

There are two sorts of eczema atopic and contact. The most common form of eczema is Atopic, which often tends to develop in our childhood sometimes even just after being born. Many children who get eczema do grow out of it as they get older, but sometimes it is possible that it will return when they become adults. It tends to run in families, it is known that if you are susceptible to other atopic conditions such as hay fever or asthma then you are more likely to get eczema.

Contact eczema usually just affects adults; it is mostly caused by being in contact with a type of allergen such as nickel, or some substances that can irritate the skin, like detergents, certain soaps, perfumes, lubricating and coolant oils as used in industry.

There is a less common form of eczema which affects the scalp and the eye-lashes which are like a severe type of dandruff, this type can also cause circular patches of eczema on any part of the body.

Bacteria that may live on the skin can aggravate the eczema causing you to scratch which breaks the skin, once broken it allows the bacteria in, this in turn intensifies the irritation.

Many people find that certain things make their eczema worse these may include:-Emotional or physical stresses, illness, certain foods that they eat, women have been known to react to their menstrual cycle, even a change in the climate can effect the skins reaction, and sufferers should be wary of any changes to their skin condition whilst in warm or high humidity climates.

You can help yourself by: trying not to scratch, wear loose cotton clothing, try to reduce stress and monitor things which affects your eczema, by avoiding these you can better control your eczema,

Even when the eczema is under control, using a daily moisturiser on the skin will help to prevent it becoming dry, creams that soften the skin and soothe keeping your skin hydrated such as our Multipurpose Skin Cream for mild cases. More specific eczema skin problems are catered for using our EC range of creams.

We also provide skin softening oils that can also be used in the bath water. Certain creams can also be used as a substitute for soap.

Itchy skin is the main symptom of eczema, we know that itching is common in other conditions; although it is an essential symptom for eczema; it is not specific and it does not always indicate that it is eczema.

Increased redness of the skin means an increase in blood flow. When skin is inflamed blood vessels widen which increases the flow of blood making the skin red, particularly noticeable after scratching.

Inflammation in eczema can be triggered by many things, but when eczema flares up it is important to take in to account the presence of bacterial infection, this can get into the deeper layers of the skin causing an increase in redness, it is important that infections are treated to bring the eczema under control.

Thickening of the skin is caused where the areas of eczema that have been inflamed are much thicker than in other areas of unaffected skin, this is due mainly to the repeated bouts of scratching. The affected areas of skin are usually where the skin needs to be flexible so the condition is aggravated as they become thick, causing splits to occur because the skin is less flexible. This also restricts the joints which in turn are unable to bend.

Blisters occur in eczema where there is less adhesion in skin cells due to inflammation, this causes scaling which makes it easy for bacteria to get into the skin and that in turn causes fluids to ooze, this then gathers causing blisters. Small blisters may occur in active eczema but sometimes larger ones occur due to the nature of the eczema. In sever cases of the skin being infected the blisters may be filled with pus as well.

Crusts on the skin are caused where inflamed skin ooze fluid, this fluid is very rich in protein, when the fluid comes in contact with the air it dries out leaving a crusty deposit and if infected the crusty deposit usually has a golden colour.

A way to grade eczema can be based on how much activity and over what period the eczema has been active.

The 3 most useful grades are as follows:-

Acute: Means rapid onset. Conditions that are prevalent over a short period of time and are also vigorous in activity, acute eczema would be an area that has just recently flared up, it is red, blisters and some has some oozing or crusts.

Chronic: Means long standing, where the initial activity has died down so a bit of the skin that has been eczematous for a while is now dry, scaly, thickened and cracked.

Infected: Eczema can become infected at any stage; this is not always obvious, it is different from acute eczema unless the blisters become pus-filled.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 24th, 2009 at 11:55 am and is filed under Eczema. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.