Children with eczema get less sleep than children who don’t for very obvious reason: itching keeps them from relaxing enough to fall asleep. Itching attacks can also flare in the middle of the night, waking the child and everyone else in the house.

Lack of sleep is serious. Tired children don’t learn as well as those who get a good night’s sleep. Sleep deprivation can make a child cranky and anxious. Over the long term, it can affect the child’s general health. Lack of sleep for the child’s parent is just as serious. Tired parents lose patience with their fussy child, creating stress which makes the child eczema worse.

The first thing is to reduce tension and stress in the family. Explore medication and relaxation techniques. To help your child sleep better, be making sure you do everything possible to keep itching under control during the day. Include an itch check at bedtime to see that all medication and moisturizers are doing their jobs. Remember that clear skin can itch, so if your child complains is itching but you don’t see a rash, treat the area just an aggressively as you would if the skin were broken.

Don’t forget to check your child scalp. Hair hides the rash of eczema very well, particularly in children with thick hair. The only clue may be mild dandruff. When you inspect closely, you may see telltale signs of eczema or even scrapes and scratches to indicate nocturnal digging. Scalp preparations for eczema are different from skin preparations. Your doctor may prescribe medication especially for scalps.

Keep pets out of your child’s bedroom to maintain a mite dander, and dust free haven in which to sleep. If the family dog enters your child’s bedroom to sniff around just once, a whole week of dust and mite reduction measures is undone. Don’t let cigarette or cigar smoke get into the bedroom. Smoke contains particulate matter that can irritate the skin directly. It also irritates the airways this reduces your child’s comfort and makes it harder for him or her to get sleep.

If your child is too warm, he or she will itch more. If you live in high pollution or high dust area, use window filters to keep your child’s room free of irritants. If there is a heat source or a radiator in the room, make sure your child’s bed is not right next to it. Direct heat can make the bed too warm as well as dry out exposed skin, leading to worse itching. Gentle fans or air-conditioning in the summer can help keep the bedroom cool.

Dr.Sarah Tyler is a dermatology specialist in UK. Let her show you how you can help your child lead a normal, enjoyable life with the Minimum Disruption From Eczema.

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 7th, 2008 at 9:27 pm 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.