Dermatologist Tips For Preventing Cradle Cap

The best option to avoid the spread of cradle cap flakes is to follow preventive measures. As you know:

“Prevention is better than cure”

Preventive measures not only help to stop the spreading of disease but also speed up the healing process. Cradle cap is one of the most common skin conditions requiring prevention more than treatment.

This skin condition is medically known as seborrheic dermatitis. It is neither contagious nor harmful. Meaning that it cannot spread from person to person and cannot harm individuals. However, severe symptoms can be unsettling and require some actions against them.

This article will give you a brief introduction to what cradle cap is, what it looks like, and 5 preventive measures to tackle it at home. So, without taking much of the time from your busy working mom’s daily schedule, let’s get started.

What is Cradle cap?

It is a harmless skin condition mostly used to refer to babies. It forms a layer of crusty or oily flakes and scaly patches mostly on the baby’s scalp.

Seborrheic Dermatitis is known as cradle cap in children and dandruff in adults. Usually, the flakes in babies are bigger than the flakes in adults. Besides covering the scalp, it also affects the diaper area, armpits, and skin folds, behind the ears, forehead, and face.

Symptoms

The symptoms may vary depending on the severity of the condition. However, most of the common symptoms of cradle cap are:

• Scaly patches on the skin
• Inflammation (severe)
• Redness in the affected area
• Crusty or oily flakes of white or yellow color
• Oily smell
• Itching (rare)

These are the symptoms. After keeping in mind these elements, you can easily identify whether your baby is affected by seborrheic dermatitis or not.

Causes

The exact cause is not known yet. However, researchers suggest that the below scenarios can lead to its occurrence in babies:

• Sebum: This is considered the main cause of cradle cap but it occurs in different scenarios. Sebum is an oil responsible for providing enough moisture to the skin. Sebaceous glands are responsible for its production. Overproduction of Sebum causes the formation of oily flakes on the skin.
• Malassezia: It is a yeast that is found in almost every human and various animal’s skin. This yeast is responsible for the health of the skin. However, it may sometimes become corrupt. The consumption of saturated fatty acids, leaving unsaturated fatty acids behind, can cause the formation of flakes on the scalp and other body parts.
• Hormonal transfer: The hormonal transfer from mother to baby can result in the overactivation of sebaceous glands. This increases the production of Sebum; ultimately leading to cradle cap.

These are common causes. No matter what causes the formation of a flaky layer, you can avoid its spread by following preventive measures.

Tips for preventing cradle cap

Give regular baths to your baby

Keeping your baby clean is one of the effective measures for its prevention. Give your baby a daily bath or as much as necessary. For newborns, one bath per week is usually enough. However, you can give a bath to your infant if exposed to dust and pollutants.

For toddlers (between 3 years of age), you can give daily baths. This helps clean the body, preventing bacteria from sticking. If your loved one is dealing with cradle cap, a daily bath with loosen flakes and speed up the healing procedure.

The rest you can clean with a cradle cap shampoo to remove residues.

Wait for natural removal

Cradle cap fades out on its own without treatment. It is possible that your baby is affected by a mild condition and you are overreacting. It is better to wait for a few weeks and let nature heal it.

Using Happy Cappy Shampoo will be your next move to deal with cradle cap if it naturally doesn’t fade out. Their products are fragrance-free, keeping your baby safe and sound from allergic reactions.

Hurrying up can result in unnecessary tasks. So, it is better to wait for natural healing while following precautionary measures.

Avoid using harsh products

You may want to remove cradle cap smell with soaps and perfumes. This will worsen the condition. It may help in dealing with smell but your baby may face allergic reactions due to scents.

Also, some products contain chemicals that can trigger allergies. Using those products on your infant or toddler is a waste of money and risking your baby’s health. Make sure to use natural remedies or medicated shampoos if you need treatment.

Don’t pick flakes

Avoid picking flakes with fingers or hair pluckers. This can help in removing flakes but also remove some hairs. Also, it weakens hair follicles, affecting hair growth.

Some people consider that cradle cap leads to hair loss. It is a half-true and half-false statement. It sometimes causes itching and when someone scratches the scalp, the hair follicles weaken, causing temporary hair loss. The hair growth will continue after proper treatment of flaky skin.

Avoid scratching

Scratching not only causes hair loss but also can cause infection. Babies have gentle skin that requires gentle treatment. Scratching will remove skin tissues making them vulnerable to bacteria; ultimately leading to an infection.

So, if you don’t want to worsen the condition, you have to stop scratching. Instead, you can use a brush with soft bristles gently on the baby’s scalp to remove flakes.

Conclusions

So these are 5 preventive measures to tackle cradle cap in babies. Keep in mind, that preventive measures sometimes prove more effective than treatment.

It is important to use as much natural easy for treatment as possible when it comes to the baby’s health. For products, choose only medically approved ones.

Hope you will follow these measures.