Effective treatments of excessive sweat and smelly feet
People who have the medical problem of excessive sweating (hyperhidrosis), causing smelly feet, have a number of treatment options open to them.
You can reduce the symptoms of primary hyperhidrosis and boost the quality of your life by making a few changes to your everyday lifestyle. This might include avoiding those things you know make you sweat more, such as alcoholic drinks or spicy foods and using antiperspirant rather than deodorant sprays. There is an important difference between the two and not everyone realises this so check before you shop.
Antiperspirant on prescription
Sometimes the antiperspirants you can buy yourself at the chemist just don’t do enough and, in these cases, your doctor can prescribe a more potent antiperspirant, often one based on aluminium chloride.
Seek help from a dermatologist
The next step would be for your GP to make an appointment for you to see a dermatologist, a specialist in dealing with skin conditions. They will be able to provide you with a comprehensive range of other treatments.
Iontophoresis
This is an effective way of dealing with excessive sweating of the hands and feet. It ‘blocks’ the sweat glands when a weak electric current is passed through water in which you have submerged your feet or hands. It sounds a bit scary but does not hurt, although some may experience mild skin irritation in the short-term.
You can buy kits to do this yourself at home. Most people need up to 10 sessions with each session lasting about half an hour.
Botox
This is a relatively new treatment in which about a dozen botulinum toxin injections (over a period of weeks) are made into the parts of the body where you sweat excessively. This reduces the amount of sweat produced by blocking the signal that moves between the brain and the sweat glands.
Surgery
In severe cases, Endoscopic thoracic sympathectomy (ETS) is a surgical procedure than can treat excessive sweating. However, there are complications and often side-effects so this is usually used as a treatment of last resort.
Secondary hyperhidrosis
This is a knock-on effect from another health condition so the treatment will depend on this underlying cause. The recommended treatment for secondary hyperhidrosis will depend on the underlying cause.
On to natural remedies for smelly feet >.
