Chapped lips

[dothawkes31]

My grandson has had a couple of bad bouts of chapped lips over the summer, and I've picked him up from school tonight and he has a very bright red ring around his mouth again, he's been using a chap stick he says, but wht does this keep happening? It never happens when he has been staying at our house and it seems to get worse during the school week. Anyone any ideas? I've encopuraged him to drink more fluids during the day, which he has access to.

cheers

[dothawkes31]

yes i assumed it was fluids, I wonder if his matabolism needs a vitamin supplement, he is half Greek-Cypriot which makes me wonder it there is maybe some deficiency in his system, he'e been getting these rashes on his face for a couple of years now,.

[pericat]

is he licking around his mouth as my youngest can get that and has had a sort of thrush infection on her tongue for which i get an oral gel from the chemist

[dothawkes31]

oh right, never occurred to me it may be that, maybe I should ask his mum to get him to a doc, though I found out in September that when they moved 2 years ago she didnlt register with another one, and so I had to use my GP.

[pericat]

going to a chemist should determine whether he has a yeast infection in his mouth dot

[dothawkes31]

I've just phoned his mother and told her it could be thrush, which makes sense to me actually as the red line is a few millimeters outside his lips, I'm calling at asdas pharmacy in a bit, he's off on a PGL type 4 day stay on monday so he needs to be right

[pericat]

i get daktarin gel for my daughter dot - lets know

[Eve]

Aww bless him.

I get them really bad when I have a cold and they are so painful.

Other things you could look at are nervous habit kind of things like chewing or sucking or lipping his lips etc... his teacher may have spotted something he doesn't do at home.

Some kind of allergy or irritation is also possible, my mouth gets really irritated when I have certain fruits and nuts.

Keeping an eye on anything he might be sharing too.

Hope he finds something to sort it. When I have had them before I found chapsticks and stuff were little use and ended up asking in Boots and one of the girls recommended this...

http://www.cymex.co.uk/

Great stuff but not sure if it's ok for children though.

[daffy654]

Could he possibly have picked up impetigo?
A friend of my son used to always have chapped lips and red areas around his mouth,when the school nurse saw him she disgnosed impetigo and he was treated for that.Children can pass the condition around very easily and it would explain why your grandson never gets the problem when not at school.

[dothawkes31]

Hi! Thanks all, I took him myself to the Tesco Pharmacist who said it was possibly heading towards impetigo but because my grandson had the red circle all around his mouth it was probably from chapped lips but it had got infected, and so he said we had to take him to the walk in centre tomorrow to get a prescription for an anti-biotic cream with a steroid in it. Glad I took him now, if he gets any worse he'll not be able to go on the trip , I've had to rely on his mum taking him and she seemed to agree to do it, I'm at work all day and so is his dad. thanks again.

[yogasun]

dot
just to add to this. My elder son used to have exactly the same thing, he had the red ring, etc. I must agree with Jenna. The only application that made any difference was Cymex. I ruled out all other things, diet, allergies, etc. It cleared it up and I made sure he always had a tube with him if he felt his lips were getting dry.Not sure about whether it's safe for children, I think my son was about 11 when it seemed to get unmanageable.
Good luck.