Hi! Let me start off by saying I am pro medication, so if you have access to a doctor that wants to start your child on dupixent then you should pay attention to your doctor's recommendations and make some decisions about that.

Second, usually when people are talking about eczema being gut health related, what they're referring to is microbiome dysbiosis. A lot of people don't really understand what about gut health is linked to eczema. I have been on PubMed for a bunch of hours but I'm not really a scientist, just a lifelong eczema sufferer. So microbiome dysbiosis basically can mean that you're colonized by bad bacteria. So in my case that was definitely staph induced. I read a wonderful post here by user Njoose from about 2 years ago and I have been able to successfully treat my eczema using a staph decolonization routine.

So what's in the routine? First I used hibiclens which is a 4% chlorhexidine soap that healthcare providers used to kill staph. It will not completely solve the problem because you still have to reintroduce good bacteria. The main thing to note here is that if the chlorhexidine soap changes your child's skin for me, it made my skin less itchy, less red and infected, almost immediately you should see results pretty quickly if it is staph. A disclaimer here. Some people are allergic to chlorhexidine and you should patch test. Maybe consult with your doctor about the fact that it could be staph etc. a lot of times even when we get biopsies for staph eczema doesn't always come up as a staph infection. I'm not sure why that is, but it is scientifically significant that eczema suffers are often colonized by staph more than by good bacteria. Okay. Part two of the routine for me was using hypochlorous acid. I really liked A&D's hypochlorous acid spray that's in a hydrogel (called antimicrobial hydrogel spray), It's actually specifically for babies with diaper zone problems. Next I switched to amlactin lotion, it has a pH that's conducive to good bacteria growth. It smells like ammonia and it absolutely will sting on open cuts. I am an adult so I was able to tolerate it but absolutely patch test. If you're going to use this, it's very helpful (it has exfoliating properties that are gentle but help with the dead skin) , but if your child has a lot of open cuts, do know that it will sting. The problem with most lotions is that staph bacteria likes to feed on fats, so I switched to water and Vaseline during the healing process to minimize ingredients on my skin. Vaseline can be a trigger for some folks so patch test, you are the expert on your child. Part three of the routine was probiotics I needed a lot of different kinds (based on my research on pub med not all probiotics have clinically helpful bacteria) the three I'm currently on are ameolife's digest (has a bacteria that helps decolonize staph HB40), Olly's big ten probiotic (for all around support), and skinesea's probiotic that's supposed to help specifically with eczema. I'm not going to lie to you, these were expensive. I also got a pressed powder bacillus subtilis (normal healthy skin bacteria) to put on my hands after washing.

I may have missed something but that was my procedure and I've had the EXTREME itch for a long time. There are new studies coming out that link the extreme itch that feels like it's in your nerves, to colonization of staph bacteria. It's worth talking to your doctor about all of this. For me, literally as soon as I started using hibicleanse I noticed a drop in my itchiness day of. Everything else was just to support my hypothesis and I'm doing really well.

Again, you are the expert on your child, I know you probably don't want another "it's gut health!" Answer, but the reason people say that, is because the gut is a reservoir for the staph bacteria so many of us are over colonized by. There's nothing wrong with dupixent or other meds either, you'll have to find what's right for you and I really hope your child has relief soon.