Free delivery on all UK orders over £20.00.

Delivery times may be a little longer than usual during the next 2 weeks, 24th July to 8th August, while we take some holiday time going out and about with our children. Please allow about 7 working days for delivery during this time. Thank you for your patience and understanding .

Dealing with rashes-Prevention

The best way to deal with nappy rash is to prevent it in the first place. Part of this is understanding what causes nappy rash. Much of this article is based on my own experience with our five children. It is not meant to be totally exhaustive, but I hope I have covered the major causes of nappy rash that you should be aware of. 

Wee and Poo. First of all, wetness in itself does not cause nappy rash, and urine is sterile when it leaves the body. Anyone familiar with wet wrap treatment for severe eczema can tell you that moist skin heals faster than dry skin, so lets get that one out of the way. It is the interaction between urine and faeces that causes most nappy rash, so the most important thing to do is to change your baby as soon as he/she has done a poo. The way that disposables help prevent nappy rash is by separating the urine and faeces (soaking the urine away into the gel), however, 10 minutes in any pooey nappy, paper and gel, or cloth, is enough to trigger a nappy rash. Make sure you clean your baby's skin thoroughly after a poo, check all those little creases. Also, thrush is present in the faeces, so to avoid a thrush rash, you must change a poo nappy as soon as possible. Either way, aim to change your baby's nappy every 2-4 hours during the day, even if it isn't totally soaked through. Don't worry about night times, babies rarely poo in them night after the first few months, and if you have taken good care at other times, your baby's skin will be in good enough condition to withstand the night in a wet nappy. Consider using a wool or fleece cover for nights, see below, about waterproof covers. 

The effect washing can have. Next, and in my opinion, this is actually the biggest cause of nappy rash in cloth, look at your washing routine. If you want to cut through the waffle and get to the point of what comes next, go straight to the next paragraph. However, if you read on, you will see why I believe the washing routine has so much to do with nappy rash.  I started my nappy washing many moons ago with a second hand twin tub. The rinse facility didn't work properly, so I had to rinse by hand, then put back in the spinner to spin. Inevitably I was often tempted to cut a rinse, or rush the job. My son (our oldest) had by far the most nappy rash of all our babies. There was much less understanding of the effects of detergents and harsh cleaning chemicals on skin even in 1982. Looking back, I'm sure I was the cause of most of the nappy rash, as I was soaking with Napisan, using too much detergent and probably not rinsing enough after the wash. By the time number two arrived in 1985, I had an automatic washing machine. I still used Napisan, but I had started to become aware of excess detergents, since I now had developed a nasty eczema rash on my hands, which the doctor said was due to detergents. I had started to cut down on detergent quantities in the wash. My oldest daughter had much less nappy rash. Then in 1988, our twins were born. I have to admit to my highest use of disposables for their first year, we used about half and half cloth and disposables, and one day I ran out of Napisan. I still soaked in plain water, but for the next few washes, I was certain that the nappies seemed softer. No rash either. Then I bought some more Napisan, and we were back to nasty hard nappies and nappy rash. So I stopped the Napisan, and never used it again. Now all of this is of course just anecdotal evidence, but none the less, it did make me much more aware of the effect of chemicals used in nappy washing, and in fact family laundry in general. From that day on, I halved the amount of washing powder recommended on the packet, and we live in a very hard water area. My machine did not die (as predicted by a well known water softener advert), it in fact lived for 14 years, and the element never did go wrong. We all had softer clothes as a consequence, and our household budget went that little bit further. And of course, our little girls didn't get nappy rash very often at all! At that time, I wasn't overly aware of the environmental impact of excess detergents and chemicals, I just found it was better for us in many ways to use less detergent. Our mothers and Grandmothers would have had to do most rinsing by hand, so the chances are they were leaving harsh detergents and chemicals such as washing soda (great on greasy kitchens, and cheap, but very harsh on skin!) behind in the nappy. It was most likely these chemical residues that were causing a large amount of the nappy rash in babies at  the time, which, added to the use of non breathable rubber or plastic pants, has led many of that generation telling us that terries cause nappy rash. My opinion is, that it was not the terries, but what we did with them that was the problem.  

Washing routine. Which leads me to one of the things I have grown to like about cloth so much, and that is the greater control you have over your baby's environment when you use cloth. No one has yet managed to extract a full list of ingredients in a disposable nappy from the manufacturers, so you have no idea what is in them. With a cotton nappy, you can know exactly what is there, because once you start washing it, it is you that controls the process. So, the first thing to do is never add more than half the amount of detergent that the manufacturer recommends. This will result in softer nappies for starters. Then make sure that the nappies are being properly rinsed. Any residues of detergent left behind in the nappy can cause skin irritation, even non bio detergent, as soon as the nappy is wet, those residues are back in solution, and will irritate the skin. Watch your machine as it gets to the last rinse cycle, if there are any bubbles on the surface of the water, set another rinse cycle. If you have a very up to date machine, chances are that this won't be necessary, but I know from experience that older machines are not quite as efficient as newer ones. (We changed our 14 year old faithful machine in 2000, we always set a second rinse cycle on the old machine, but the new one doesn't need it at all.) You may also need to experiment with a few detergent brands, as some babies are sensitive to one brand (maybe the perfumes?), but not another. It goes without saying that you should only use non bio for routine washing. 

Soaking. Backtracking a little to my own experience again, as I said in the second paragraph, we decided that soaking in Napisan was contributing to nappy rash in our babies. When I first discovered prefolds for our last daughter (born in 1998), I bought some Nappy Fresh for, soaking, as it is kinder to the environment, and I thought it would be kinder to the skin too. Once again though, when I experimented, I discovered she was red when I did use it, but not when I didn't. So I stopped using it. It may be that your baby is fine with it, but do look at such things if you are struggling to bring nappy rash under control. If you do want to soak, then try using tea tree oil instead. Again, some babies (not many) are sensitive to this, so also try not soaking at all, or just using plain water. We didn't soak at all after a few months with our last daughter, she had the least nappy rash of all our children, and when she did, I could always point to the cause, e.g. poo nappy on too long, or teething redness. 

Waterproof Pants. In our climate in the UK it is unreasonable to expect babies to wear nothing over their nappy, so we use some kind of waterproof or water resistant cover to protect the outer layer of clothes. While this is not a direct cause of nappy rash, it can make certain types of rash worse. In particular, thrush loves to grow and multiply in a very warm moist environment, which is exactly what waterproof pants over a wet nappy provide. The thrush won't start up by itself in a wet nappy, urine is sterile when it leaves the body. Thrush starts from faeces. So if your baby was left just a little too long in a poo nappy (we've all done it, no need to feel too guilty), or wasn't cleaned well enough at nappy change time, then the thrush yeast can start to grow. Then, nicely encased in a plastic cover, baby wees in the night, the temperature inside the plastic cover rises, the thrush yeast are having a party and multiplying like there's no tomorrow. Of course, when the said tomorrow does arrive, you remove junior's nappy, and hey presto, red raw bot! All the time you continue to use a plastic non breathable cover, the thrush is getting worse. So, please, please do use breathable covers, either waterproof breathables, such as polyurethane bonded polyester or nylon, or totally breathables, such as wool or fleece. Waterproof breathable covers offer a properly waterproof barrier, but allow some exchange of air to keep the nappy temperature down a little. Wool in particular keeps the nappy temperature cooler to the touch, and this is my strong recommendation if you have a baby who is prone to attacks of thrush. Please note that you will probably need a prescription only cream for thrush, if you suspect that your baby has thrush, please see the doctor. In the meantime, make sure you are using a breathable cover to help the healing and to help prevent further recurrence. 

Teething. This can be a bit of a bone of contention, but most parents agree that for some reason their babies seem prone to a red bottom when teething. This often seems to occur overnight, and we found that using silk liners routinely at those times more or less prevented it. Dealing with rashes-first aid for more details. 

Diet. There is no doubt in many people's minds that what goes in must affect what comes out, this can affect skin health. For example, tomatoes are quite acidic as are plums and oranges. There is anecdotal evidence to suggest that these, among some other foods, are implicated in nappy rash in some babies. If you suspect a particular food is causing a problem, try reducing or cutting it out. Please do take nutritional advice from your Health Visitor though, I am not qualified to tell you what your baby should or should not eat. 

Health. Your baby's general health can also affect his/her skin health. As an eczema sufferer myself, I can confirm this, even in adults. So if your baby is under the weather with a cold for example, don't panic if he/she gets a bit of a red bottom. Silk liners are the best for this kind of situation, they help to keep the redness to a minimum. Also, when your baby is on a course of anti-biotics, not only does this often cause mild diarrhoea meaning you have to keep on top of nappy changes more than usual, it can also trigger a bit of a sore bottom in itself.