It appears that my young son is allergic to metal. Anytime snaps on his jumper touch his skin, he gets red welts. THe other day, his daycare provider forgot to put one of those onesie things on him while he was wearing overalls. The metal from the overalls lit him right up.
What causes this? For the life of me, I can’t understand. This is something I’ve never seen before.
Has he seen a doctor about it yet? It sounds like he may have a sensitivity to nickel, which could be causing contact dermatitis. I have a friend who makes jewelry, and he had to stop using metals that contained nickel (really difficult, because so many metals do) because his hands would break out in a rash every time he touched it.
Allergies to nickel are pretty common, so a pediatrician should be able to figure out if that is what it is.
Bottle of Smoke has hit it on the head. If my earrings aren’t 24k gold my earlobes swell like I have an infection, and I have to be careful which watches I buy - the wrong casing makes my wrist break out. MiniCyni’s skin is especially sensitive, so for him it would be even worse, I’d suppose.
My 15 yo stepson is allergic to metal… always has been. I believe it’s a chemical reaction with the skin, but I don’t really understand how it works. One way we deal with it, since he has to wear a watch for example, is to coat the part of the watch that touches his wrist with clear nailpolish. That keeps the metal from reacting to him… but necklaces, rings etc. that are untreated cause him to break out in a rash that never goes away…
I am a contact dermatitis sufferer. Nickel is indeed a prime offender. Nickel is present in almost every metal even many alloys of high quality, jewelry-grade gold. However, even though it is present in stainless steel the lattice structure of stainless steel is such that the nickel is unable to escape or to be leached out by perspiration or moisture. Therefore, people with contact dermatitis are usually able to wear stainless steel jewelry or watch bands.
The reaction is your body’s immune system run amok. Either it is ubale to manufacture the proper antibody to counteract the intruder or it manufactures the wrong type. Meanwhile, histamines are flooding the site of contact. This is where the rash, swelling & oozing/weeping discharge comes from.
Topical steroid creams help a little. My dermatologist knows me well enough that I have a standing authorization for various kinds of ointments when I call in.
I, too, am allergic to nickel - a fact I didn’t discover for the first 30 years of my life. That’s the point at which I bought a pair of Ralph Lauren eyeglass frames and began my year of torture. Whenever I perspired, my (apparently) unusually acidic perspiration reacted with the nickel, sending shooting pains not unlike mild electric shocks zapping through my temples and eventually pitting the metal of the frames so badly that they finally shattered when I dropped them one day. By the time that happened, they’d etched permanent grooves on either side of my head - grooves which remain with me even now.
I got titanium frames, which made the problem stop instantly. The eyeglass store said that stainless steel also would work.
I never got a rash, though - just the constant electric shocks.
I’ve seen contact dermatitis to chromium too. Steroid creams reduce the symptoms, but its usually best to remove the offending metal. Often people with atopic dermatitis have flare-ups at the site of metal exposure.
Qadgop, MD
I can’t wear anything gold in my ears, no matter how pure it it, since it all contains some nickel. If I wear a gold necklace that touches my skin I break out…sounds like your son is going to be one of us who only wears silver jewelry, too.
I react to gold too. Most shops which sell jewellery also sell a sealant which you can paint on to metals you can’t avoid coming in contact with - otherwise, as suggested earlier, try clear nail polish.