This. I have a large aloe plant on my patio. Whenever I get burned I just break off a piece and apply it.
I seriously doubt it.
Not necessarily. I’ve had a 2nd degree sunburn. Not fun. I could do nothing but lie in bed and sleep for 3 days, my legs swollen like elephant legs, until the massive water blisters popped and my skin came off in a few long, wide, and thick strips. Thank goodness it was only my legs, and only on top of my legs. (Sailing, wearing a tshirt, and having arms that had a bit of tan, unlike my white lets.) Also thank goodness I was only 15 with healthy skin that rebounded quickly.
I’m a very fair-skinned person who spent lots of time at the beach, and I’ve had so many sunburns that now when I get them, they hardly even hurt (they certainly look a lot worse than they feel). No doubt I will make a skin doc rich as I age. I do try very hard to avoid them now, after three or four carcinomas.
The advice above by DrDeth and Cardinal is good advice, in my experience. Even a warm shower is painful, with a sunburn. The main benefit to a very hot shower would be like hitting yourself in the head with a hammer: it feels so good when it stops!
Aloe works wonders, reducing pain, peeling, and longevity of the burn. Analgesics help too. I’m more of an Ibuprofen guy, but I don’t really know what works best.
A hot bath or hot tub is the best way to alleviate the pain of a kidney stone, though. At least, for me. Too bad it’s too hot in there to stay in long, though! But thank goodness for even 30 minutes of relief.
Yup!
My mother tried that when I was young. Nope, not for me! Worse than doing nothing.
Best stuff ever. The 99% pure Aloe bottles are great, too. Anything else is more money and less aloe, with no benefit that I ever noticed. I also dislike the aloe with pain killers, too – not sure why, but that’s what my body tells me. I’m not sure why I reach for Ibuprofen either. Could be the marketing, but I suspect it’s just my body telling me what it thinks is best (and it could be jiving me too.)
You’re wrong and several physicians in this thread have already debunked this method. Please don’t put hot water on a burn.
USCDiver, MD
The ibuprofen is anti inflammatory, and along with a cool bath (and aspirin in the days before the NSAIDS) has been a mainstay for sunburn relief. I like a couple of cups of baking soda in the bath, too, as it’s soothing and reduces swelling. All of that adds up to less pain, always a Good Thing. I need to get another aloe plant…I seem to kill them…
I worked in a burn unit in Syracuse, in another life, and a little as an agency nurse at Harborview. There was a man in 1983 who fell into a cooling tank at Hanford(radioactive water) who was a bit parboiled; he had first, second, and deep second burns all over except his face. I wasn’t allowed to care for him as he set the rad detectors off big time, and I was pregnant. Ibuprofen was new then, and prescription, and there was large discussion about its use for him.
Please “realize as hot as one can stand it” may very well be a good bit cooler than a regular shower temperature when talking about the sunburn in a shower trick.
I have used the warm water on painful burns trick to stop the pain (usually on a burned finger), and it works well for me. Note I said warm, not hot water- I always check it with an unburned digit to make sure it’s merely warm. I stick the burned finger in the warm water as long as I can stand it, then remove it. It then quits hurting pretty much for good, unlike the temporary relief cold brings. If the warm water is really cooler than normal bath temperature, can it cause any more damage?
… but ground pepper can seal a small cut very effectively.
Salt and Water can be used as a disinfectant.
Salt’s OK but 5% iodine is much better.
After reading these posts, I looked on Wiki to see why Aloe seems so effective in treating burns. They’ve got basically nothing. They list only one recent (2007) study on the topic with indications that there may be something to the claim. I’m surprised that there isn’t more data, given all the anecdotal evidence that seems to be out there. (We have our own family story about using it, effectively, to treat a hot stove burn once.) Maybe the Aloe Vera industry doesn’t have a lot of money to throw around on research.
It’s as bad an idea now as it was in 2006 - do NOT put hot water on burns.
It makes about as much sense as putting ice on frostbite.
Please, define hot- what temperature? Body temperature water can feel plenty hot to a sunburn. Would 98 degree F water cause more damage to a burn? I’m not arguing, I’m asking at what temperature the water would have to be to cause more damage.
I was told by a dermatologist once that aloe speeds the turnover (and therefore healing) of cells, but then in doing so it’s more likely to scar.
I live in Hawaii and deal with suburns all the time. Taking a hot shower is seriously the best way to eliminate the pain of a sunburn. The hot water works the same way as when people wash their face, the hot water opens the pores in your skin and the heat can escape faster. You caN put aloe on, but that covers the burn. Unless you have a severe burn, (bleeding) you never cover the burn.
When I was a young child, I got a wicked sunburn while visiting my grandparents in Miami. My grandmother had a huge aloe plant in her yard. She broke off a piece and gently applied the slimy juice all over my sunburn. I remember how I felt instant relief.
To this day, I’ve grown a large aloe plant among my houseplants. Whenever I get any kind of burn, I just break off a piece for instant relief.
I know that taking a hot shower works if you have bug bites. I don’t think it works for a sunburn. I think cool is the way to go there.
If you have bug bites AND a sunburn, I feel for you. (been there.)
I am also, weirdly enough, allergic to aloe. It gives me what looks like a sunburn, so I’ve never been brave enough to try it on an actual sunburn, in which case it might actually help, I don’t know.
I’ve also heard of putting vinegar on sunburn.
What, STILL? 
Medical advice(much of which is wrong) belongs in IMHO rather than General Questions. Moved.
samclem, moderator.
This appears to be bad advice. Cold water applied directly is much better at cooling your skin than using hot water to open pores. What is exactly escaping from these open pores? I don’t see how that would help heat escape since nothing comes out of your pores.
Cool showers or baths are the recommended treatment.
http://www.webmd.com/skin-problems-and-treatments/tc/sunburn-home-treatment
Floridian here.
Cool bath/shower. Soap only where you get stinky.
I used to keep aloe with lidocaine in the fridge and apply on sunburned skin.
Also, Aleve while it hurts. I’d use 3 tablets with food.
You can try lotion as well, but it never helped me much. The sunburn always peeled.
YMMV on all of this. I’m pretty pale.
As someone who got sunburned more than I ought to have as a pool and beach loving kid and teenager, here’s my take:
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NSAIDS tend to work rather well- they really do knock back the overall pain and irritation.
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Things like aloe work like gangbusters… for a short period, until they dry out. I suspect there’s nothing special at all about aloe, and that you could probably slather yourself in some other kind of water-based gel/slime and you’d have the same exact effect.
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The spray burn relief products with topical anesthetics like Dermoplast (the only one I can remember) work very well. A combination of those and NSAIDs will knock most of the serious discomfort out of a sunburn.
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There isn’t a thing you can do to prevent peeling, except not getting sunburnt in the first place. Peeling isn’t a consequence of dry skin or anything like that, it’s a consequence of the sunlight actually damaging and/or killing your skin cells and them sloughing off in a more uniform and rapid fashion than usual. Lotion does help with the itching somewhat though.
Noxema is the best thing for a sunburn. It moisturizes and cools at the same time.