Acne / pimples?

[BellyBelly]

Elijah has some acne / pimples on his upper arms - does anyone else know of this? It's not like lots of whiteheads everywhere, it's like I have seen on blokes before, lots of bumpy pimple like things. There are one or two small whiteheads. Strange... wonder if it would have anything to do with hormones and breastmilk?

[Melinda]

It could be I guess? I'm not sure? The other thing I just thought of is perhaps it could be a little reaction to something? Have you started putting suncream on that part of his arms, or perhaps started using a different suncream? Some babies/toddlers seem to be sensitive to certain suncreams on certain parts of their bodies whilst not sensitive to it on other parts!

[Antheia]

I have notices Lily has her milk rash back for some reason, not sure if this is the same thing or not?

[mum5boyz]

Kelly, Zachary has that on his upper arms - no where else - and he has since he was about 9 months old. It comes and goes, by that I mean that some days it feels really bumpy and you can see it and other days it's not noticeable to the eye but I can feel it. Is that what you mean?? The doctor told me to just moisturise the skin with a hypo-allergenic moisturiser after he has a bath or shower and now he's old enough he uses a loofah in the shower to get rid of any dead skin cells.

[Astrid]

Could be what I have. Cant remember the name, but it is where the skin cells do not shed properly so the oil in the skin gets trapped. All I can do is use exfoliants, especially strong AHA's to keep it at bay. Antibiotics also seem to help. Apparently it is genetic, common amongst those of Celtic descent.

Edited to add this, I remember my mother mentioning that I had the pimples when I was a baby. This info is from the Neostrata site

Keratosis Pilaris

Keratosis Pilaris (KP) is a skin (follicular) condition that appears as rough bumps around hair follicles (goose-bump like appearance) on the skin of the back and outer side of the upper arms and thighs. KP is typically most developed and noticeable in adolescent females. KP is an extremely common condition that can be cosmetically troubling but is generally not harmful in a medical sense. The condition is benign, self-limiting, and disappears with increasing age.

The bumps result from the improper shedding of scales from the skin in and around the affected hair follicles. Keratosis pilaris tends to be more severe during the winter months or other times of low humidity. It occurs because as the skin renews itself, old skin cells in the affected hair follicles get stuck, forming a scaly plug because the old skin cells are excessively adherent and do not shed easily. Each bump is a horny plug, sometimes red but only rarely itchy. The scale buildup often entraps the hair within the follicle.

Treatment of KP using moisturizing and exfoliating creams and lotions with high strength AHA or urea products may be helpful. They generally need to be applied at least twice daily and work by softening and reducing cell cohesion of the adherent skin scales around the follicle enabling them to be shed more easily. Often the use of a Buff-Puff to apply the cleansers and creams and to exfoliate the skin increases the benefits of these products. Since KP is genetic, the skin returns to its pretreatment character if treatment is discontinued. Therefore people who are prone to this condition usually benefit from the regular use of these exfoliating moisturizing products as part of their skincare regimen.

If you think you may have keratosis pilaris and are troubled by its appearance, you can seek the advice of your dermatologist or other physician.

[kelly2202]

Jack has had this since he was a baby on his upper arms and the doctor told me it was a form of Excema. He doesn't use soap as that seems to make it worse and it has decreased as he gets older but it is still there. It doesn't itch and he never complains about it.

Cheers

[min]

Jackson has developed an area around one of his eyes with little red dots, some days they have little white heads on them, other days it almost dissapears completely and some days it is horribly red and looks almost bruised. i have taken him to three different doctors over the last month and had three different answers. am taking him to another one on friday because it is worse again. most viable response so far is a viral skin infection which has no treatment, could take upto 8 weeks to dissapear. has been about 4 or 5 weeks so far.

[Melinda]

I was actually just about to post that it could also be a eczema-related thing!