Eczema is an aggravating, but fortunately relatively harmless medical condition. It causes a person’s skin to become very dry and itchy and can result in an unsightly rash that can make the sufferer reluctant to bare their skin in public. Eczema is a chronic condition, but there are many ways to treat it, with varying degrees of success. Skin lotions and topical creams, even prescription ones, are only treating the symptoms and not the cause. One suspected cause of eczema is contamination found in tap water, and being aware of this issue can offer great relief to people suffering.
Regular tap water is filtered and relatively safe to drink and bathe in, but that does not mean that it is the healthiest option available. There are hundreds of ways for drinking water to become contaminated, including chemicals leeching into the water supply, airborne pollutants and leaking pipes to name a few. To make things worse, most cities add disinfecting chemicals chlorine and chloramine which are abrasive toxins that can irritate human skin and lungs. These chemicals can greatly aggravate a person’s eczema. Besides chlorine, there are literally thousands of other contaminants in water, with some of the most common (and the most aggravating to eczema) being fluoride, barium, and mercury. To have a picture of what may possibly be the chemicals in the water causing eczema, individuals can contact their local water authority for a list of specific contaminants in their area or have a sample of their water tested by a lab to determine their water quality.
The human body is designed to cope with many things, but chemicals in drinking water are very taxing on the body. The liver and kidneys process all toxins in the human body and act as a sponge to soak up the contaminants and protect the body. However, some people’s bodies cannot process and expel certain chemicals as well as others, and this could lead to problems like eczema. The human skin can also absorb many of these chemicals, so bathing and drinking tap water can make an eczema patient’s symptoms more severe, but there are ways to ease the symptoms.
Filtering the tap water to remove those chemicals is a good one. There are many water filtering products on the market, from basic faucet and pitchers filters to advanced reverse osmosis systems that can remove pollutants from water. An eczema patient can do their health a huge favor by purchasing the right water filter to remove these chemicals from their drinking water. There are even shower filters that can help purify the water a person bathes in to reduce their exposure to contaminants. Bottled water is another option, but can be more expensive, environmentally unfriendly, and may also have small amounts of contamination.
Once a person has reduced the contamination in their water, their health and skin should see an improvement. If It may not remove eczema completely there are still some other options. There are prescription creams and lotions that will ease the dry skin of eczema; there are also some over the counter remedies. Patients may also want to review and modify their diet or seek the help of an herb specialist to suggest herbal teas and mixtures to help.