Whenever the summer is hot, many mothers are worried: If your baby got heat rash last year, will he or she get it again this year? Is there any way to prevent prickly heat in babies? What should I do if my baby has heat rash? Should I go to the doctor? To solve these confusions, let’s first understand why our skin sweats, because sweating and heat rash are closely related. In addition to mucous membrane parts such as the mouth and eyes, our entire body has a large number of small sweat glands in the skin. The sweat secreted by the small sweat glands is discharged through a thin duct (medically known as the sweat duct, which opens on the surface of our skin), which is often referred to as the sweating process. Under normal circumstances, our skin is constantly producing sweat, but the amount produced is so small that we cannot feel it. When the weather is very hot or after strenuous exercise our skin secretion of sweat will increase significantly, a large amount of sweat out of the body, the evaporation of sweat on the surface of the skin will take away a large amount of heat, thus playing a role in reducing body temperature. So sweating is our innate “ability” to regulate body temperature and prevent our body from overheating. Why do you get heat rash after sweating? In summer, when the temperature is too high and the air humidity is too high, the sweat of the baby cannot evaporate in time after sweating. The sweat is not discharged from the body but enters the surrounding skin tissue, causing local irritation, and many small red bumps appear on the skin surface, which is prickly heat. Clinically, prickly heat can be divided into three types, crystal heat, red heat and deep heat, most babies suffer from red heat, crystal heat and deep heat are rare. Prickly heat is caused by excessive sweating and the sweat does not evaporate in time, so whether or not your baby has prickly heat this year is not related to whether or not your baby had prickly heat last year. How can I prevent my baby from getting heat rash? Now that we know why babies get prickly heat, we can prevent it by targeting it. First of all, don’t let your baby sweat excessively: 1, the outdoor temperature is very high between 10 am and 2 pm in summer, so try to let your baby play indoors during this time and don’t go out. 2. Properly turn on the air conditioner to lower the indoor temperature, which can effectively reduce the chances of your baby getting prickly heat. Do not worry too much about the side effects of air conditioning, as long as the difference between the indoor temperature and the outside temperature is not too large (generally to reduce 5 ℃ is appropriate), and regularly open the windows, ventilation, the use of air conditioning will not cause harm to the baby. There is information that as long as the baby does not sweat for 8 hours in a day, it can effectively prevent prickly heat from occurring. 3, to give the baby to wear a good texture of cotton clothes, because cotton clothing breathable, sweat-absorbing. The baby’s summer clothes are easy to wide some, easy ventilation and sweat evaporation. And in time to replace the baby sweat wet clothes. 4, if the baby’s hair is very thick, it will affect the skin heat, easy to grow heat rash. You can cut your baby’s hair shorter, but try not to shave your baby’s head. Because when shaving the head, the blade will easily scrape the scalp and cause skin infection. It does not matter if your baby sweats, as long as the sweat evaporates or is washed away in time, you will not grow prickly heat: 1. Bathe regularly. In summer, you can give your child two or three baths a day, the bath itself can reduce body temperature, reduce sweating, and at the same time can be washed off the surface of the skin sweat. But be careful not to use too much bath soap, soap, so as not to lose too much oil on the surface of the skin. Just use water to wash off the sweat. Do not take too long to take a bath, control in about 10 minutes. After the bath, use a soft towel to dry the baby’s skin, especially pay attention to the bottom of the baby’s neck, armpits, thigh roots and other folded parts of the skin dry, do not leave moisture. After wiping dry, the folded parts can be properly puffed with some talcum powder or prickly heat powder to keep the skin dry. 2. Fan regularly. When you take your baby out, don’t forget to bring a fan. This will not only help your baby’s sweat evaporate in time to prevent heat rash, but also prevent mosquitoes from bothering your baby, so you can kill two birds with one stone. What should I do after my baby has heat rash? How to care for a baby with heat rash? 1, cut short nails: prickly heat is often accompanied by varying degrees of itchiness, scratching not only aggravates the inflammatory skin reaction, resulting in the baby’s prickly heat aggravation. If the baby’s nails are too long, scratching may also break the skin, increasing the chance of skin infection. 2, pay attention to skin cleanliness and hygiene: bathe regularly, wash hands regularly, and change clothes regularly. Towels, pillowcases, sheets and other household items should also be frequently cleaned and replaced to keep the baby’s skin clean and hygienic and prevent skin infections. 3, local can be appropriate topical prickly heat powder, 1% mint stove glycerine lotion, etc., applied 3-4 times a day, has a certain itch, absorb some sweat and promote the role of symptom relief, but not excessive use, otherwise it may increase skin damage, resulting in prickly heat aggravation. 4, give your baby more mung bean soup, or drink water with honeysuckle, which has the effect of clearing heat, detoxifying and moistening, and has a certain preventive and therapeutic effect on your baby’s prickly heat. Or mung beans, adzuki beans and black beans together in soup, also has the effect of clearing heat and detoxifying, strengthening the spleen and relieving dampness. 5, in the baby’s bath water appropriate to add some heat detoxification of Chinese medicine, such as the summer heat to prickly heat water, ten drops of water, etc., on the baby’s prickly heat also has a certain treatment and prevention effect. Our folklore is useful to treat prickly heat by giving the baby a bath after boiling water with horsetail. But in any case, all the above methods only play a certain role in the treatment and prevention of prickly heat in babies. In the hot summer, unless you provide your baby with a cool, dry environment and ensure that your baby is sweat-free for 8 hours in a day, your baby’s heat rash will not completely subside. When do I need to take my baby to the doctor? Prickly heat has the potential to become a combination of skin infections. When your baby has a fever, swollen lymph nodes behind the ear or neck, small superficial pustules on the surface of the heat rash, or large red painful bumps the size of a pea or even larger on the forehead of your baby’s scalp, it often means that your baby’s heat rash may be combined with a skin infection.