[Medical Q&A] If my baby has prickly heat, will calamine and prickly heat powder be effective?

Author: Wang Shan Beijing Children's Hospital, Capital Medical University

Reviewer: Ma Lin, Chief Physician, Beijing Children's Hospital, Capital Medical University

In most cases, prickly heat can heal itself when the environment is cool. You can use a fan or air conditioner to cool the environment, and take a warm shower every day to remove sweat. It should be noted that once you have heat rash, you should reduce scratching to prevent scratching and infection. In the early stages of prickly heat, you can apply topical calamine, which has an astringent effect and helps promote the disappearance of prickly heat. If prickly heat appears in the late stage, the inflammatory reaction is more severe (such as combined with prickly heat), or the itching is obvious, you can use topical glucocorticoids to promote the disappearance of the rash. In this case, you need to see a doctor.

In most cases, prickly heat powder plays a preventive role. When you sweat slightly, the powder can absorb moisture and dry it. However, if you use a lot of it when you sweat a lot, it will form granular substances after absorbing sweat, which is more likely to cause pore blockage, hinder sweating, and may even breed bacteria, aggravating prickly heat. In addition, prickly heat powder is a fine particle. It is inevitable that fine powder will float in the air during use. If the baby inhales the powder, it will have potential adverse effects on the baby's respiratory tract.