How treatment works

Understanding how your child's treatment works is an important part of coping with eczema. There are several reasons why:

Following a treatment plan as advised can really help to manage your child's eczema
Your child's treatment plan may be complicated, with different treatments to use on different parts of the body, or to use at different times depending on how their eczema is
Understanding how treatment works will help you to explain it to your child and encourage them to accept it
Feeling confident to recognise flare-ups and 'step up' treatment accordingly is an effective way to manage your child's eczema
Being able to 'step down' the treatment will prevent over use of unnecessary medication

Every time your child sees their doctor or nurse, he or she will assess their skin to decide whether their eczema is clear, mild, moderate or severe. The treatment your child receives will depend on this assessment and is managed in a stepwise way:

Step 3 - Additional treatments Step 2 - Topical steroids Step 1 - Emollients

Your doctor or nurse should spend time with you and your child explaining what each treatment they prescribe is for. They should also give you a demonstration on how to apply each treatment and written information you can take away with you.

Getting to grips with your child's emollient » « What causes my child's eczema to flare-up?