Is Your Baby Suffering From Eczema? Hard Water Could Be to Blame.

Skin rashes are common among babies. If your little one suffers from excessive skin rashes, it may be eczema and it could be possibly due to hard water. Read to know how hard water effects your baby's gentle skin.

Eczema appears as red and crusty patches on baby’s skin accompanied with skin becoming itchy, inflamed, dry, and cracked. According to WebMD, the condition goes away by the time a baby turns 2, but in about the half the cases, a baby will have it as an adult.

Being a parent of a baby suffering from eczema is a painful experience and leaves them helpless. Not only it is tough to watch a baby battle with eczema, trying to discover the reason for this disease’s symptoms leaves them baffled. Eczema breakouts are often confused to be skin rashes.

Even after eliminating certain foods, trying different skin creams, changing laundry detergent or changing the clothes altogether, doesn’t help the miserable child. However, most of the new parents ignore the connection between eczema and hard water.

Hard Water and Effects on Baby Skin – Establishing the Relationship

Parents often believe water-only baths to be the best way of keeping their baby’s skin healthy. This may not always be the case especially for families living in a hard water area.

Hard water is simply water that contains high levels of minerals. Hardness in water is caused due to salts of calcium and magnesium which are essential components of a healthy diet, however, don’t work very well on water used for drinking or bathing.

Hard water doesn’t play well on the skin due to two reasons:

Minerals present in hard water clog skin pores. This prevents the flow of oils from the skin and consequently resulting in dry skin.

Hard water reduces the solubility of detergents, soaps, and shampoos often leaving behind a soap scum or think film on the skin. This scum causes skin dryness and irritation even in adults. So just imagine, what it would do the gentle baby skin?

What Research on Eczema says?

Independent research published in The Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology puts the water quality and its effect on an infant’s skin under the microscope.

Another research conducted by Kings’s College London and Sheffield University UK links the development of eczema condition in babies to high levels of water hardness. The study reveals that exposing the skin to hard water damages the skin barrier, making it vulnerable to external threats and sensitive to potential irritants.

The research examined 1,300 three-month-old babies across the UK and gathered data on water hardness and concentration of chlorine in the home water supply. This revealed that living in a hard water area increased the risk of eczema by nearly 87 percent.

The same report highlights that pH level of water also plays a vital role. Hard water is generally alkaline with pH levels above 7.5. Because skin has pH levels in the acidic range (usually 6.5), bathing with hard water increases the alkalinity of skin and hence, disturbs its balance.

The acidic film on the skin’s surface is known as acid mantle which functions as a barrier to protect the skin. Exposure to hard water damages this skin barrier and may contribute to the development of eczema. For the babies already suffering from this condition, the study confirmed, hard water worsens the situation.

Is Soft Water the Solution?

Soft water cannot be considered a cure for eczema, and there’s still no concrete evidence to support it as an effective solution.

However, the logical conclusion is that soft water is better on the skin than hard water. Soft water generated by the ion-exchange process in a water softener extracts out the salts of calcium and magnesium. This ensures baby is getting in contact with water that doesn’t irritate his skin. Clothes washed in soft water remain soft and gentle on baby’s skin.

Generally, soft water provides additional benefits in terms of reduced energy costs and low maintenance of water appliances. Having hardness-free water in a home can be an essential precautionary measure to reduce the breakout of eczema.

Other important measures to be taken to reduce the chances of babies infected with eczema is the use of mild toiletries, liquid baby cleansers, and fragrance-free baby wipes. It is also essential to keep the baby skin hydrated using a little bath emollient in the water. Using skincare products designed specially for babies ensures their sensitive skin remains healthy.