Allergy to gold: symptoms and causes, what to do for treatment

09.07.2017
As it turns out, you can actually get gold fever if we are talking about allergic reactions to the precious metal. If you buy low-quality jewelry, you may find red marks on your body after trying it on. The main irritant that causes people to be allergic to gold is nickel, which is often added to the alloy. Why is it used? Because it is inexpensive, quite rigid and matches the color.

In order not to find out from your own experience whether there is an allergy to gold, it is better to opt for silver jewelry - they definitely will not cause an allergy. Those who favor gold are recommended to make purchases in certified stores, choosing a high standard of metal.

The main causes of allergies to gold

Sometimes a small rash, redness, and swelling appear on a person’s body after wearing gold jewelry - this is an allergy. It appears in the place where the gold came into direct contact with the body, but sometimes it can actually be detected in other places on the body. The reasons for its occurrence may be the following:

The jewelry has small cracks or pores, inside which products accumulate during washing or washing dishes, and subsequently irritate the skin.
A low quality product often contains copper, nickel, silver, copper and more. Such impurities can often cause an allergic reaction.
Factory polishing, which occurs exclusively on a new product, tends to cause irritation on human skin.
A cream or other cosmetic product interacts when it comes into contact with gold and other precious metals that are part of it, causing an irritating reaction.
A person is characterized by individual intolerance to one or another additive that is present in gold. In this case, the jewelry can be made of high-quality gold - it makes no difference.

It is not difficult to identify the causes of irritation on the body when wearing gold jewelry. Here it is much more difficult to refuse to wear jewelry, especially if it is memorable, a symbol of a good family history or tradition. In addition, identifying an allergic reaction to an engagement ring in one of the newlyweds can be a bad omen and lead to bad thoughts.

Experts note that precious metal made from low-quality gold can spoil the impressions and feelings of starting a new life. To avoid this, you need to purchase jewelry only from those gold houses that have earned the respect of their customers over the years.

Treatment

If the allergy symptoms are not too serious, you can cope on your own. In advanced cases, a doctor's advice is necessary.

First of all, you need to remove the jewelry, rinse the skin with clean water or, if the earlobes are infected, with an antiseptic. Then the affected areas should be anointed with a special ointment or gel.

Antihistamines – Fenistil-gel, Psilo-balm, Soventol, etc.
Antiseptics - erythromycin, furatsilin ointment, Levosin, etc.
Drugs that promote regeneration - Actovegin, Bepanten, Videstim, etc.
Hormonal drugs - used for significant damage - ointments with hydrocortisone, prednisolone, Dermovate, Afloderm, Cinacort, etc. Such drugs are used only on the recommendation of a doctor. They are not prescribed for children.

Traditional methods

It must be used with caution so as not to provoke additional allergic manifestations to existing ones.

Wipe the affected area with alcohol tincture of calendula, peony, and chamomile. You can brew these herbs and make lotions.
Fresh potato juice, apple or cucumber juice helps a lot. Compresses are applied for 15-20 minutes.
To reduce itching, an effective way is to lubricate the skin with butter or sour cream and wash it off after half an hour.
Inflamed earlobes can be washed with a solution of sea salt or lubricated with propolis tincture.
Cut the aloe leaf and attach it to the lobe, securing it on both sides with a band-aid. Keep for two hours.
Mix pine balm (sold at the pharmacy) with melted butter and lubricate itchy and inflamed areas.

Main symptoms of gold allergy

If a person wears gold jewelry for a long time, symptoms may appear that indicate an allergy to the precious metal. Among the most common it is time to highlight:

the appearance of a rash on the body, which first usually appears directly at the site of skin contact with gold and subsequently spreads to other parts of the body;
already after 20 minutes of wearing gold jewelry by a person, an allergy can manifest itself on the fingers, ears or neck - redness, tingling, swelling may appear;
It is possible that you may have an allergic reaction to a gold ring or earrings in the form of blisters that look like nettle burns (in addition, they can disappear and appear again).

It is worth noting that if any symptoms appear, you should immediately remove the jewelry so as not to pinch the blood vessels and aggravate the situation.

Experts note that if symptoms of gold or black spots on the skin appear after it, you should immediately make an appointment with an allergist. Otherwise, you can get a form of allergy that manifests itself very slowly, but is very difficult to treat.

Interestingly, an allergic reaction to jewelry on the ears tends to occur less frequently, which is not the case with rings and bracelets. Why? The metal in the earrings has very little contact with human skin.

Why does finger fungus occur?

One of the most common skin diseases caused by pathogenic organisms is finger fungus. This disease is also called mycosis. Anyone can become a victim of the disease, regardless of age and social status, because the fungus can live in public transport, the gym, sauna, etc.

The virus begins to become active when the immune system is weakened. The fungus can progress at elevated air temperatures, with profuse sweating or with minor mechanical stress. Often hand disease occurs due to:

long-term use of antibiotics;
weakened immune system;
undergone chemotherapy;
diabetes;
severe stress;
disruption of the endocrine system;
nail injuries.

Allergy to gold during pregnancy

Sometimes it happens that a woman who has never previously suffered from an allergic reaction to gold jewelry experiences discomfort from wearing jewelry for the first time. Experts explain this by the natural restructuring of the hormonal system of the female body, as well as changes in metabolic processes.

It should be noted that an allergic reaction to precious metal in pregnant women is often a temporary phenomenon and should not be frightened. After the baby is born and the mother’s body has restored all processes and systems, allergy symptoms will no longer bother the young mother.

Allergy to gold in children

Many parents today are concerned about the appearance of an allergic reaction in their child to jewelry - chains, earrings. Experts give some useful tips that should be taken into account if a similar situation occurs:

If there is any suspicion regarding the quality of the jewelry alloy, it must be immediately removed from the child and replaced with a better one.
If a child really has an intolerance to gold, but the parents want him to wear precious jewelry (for example, a cross with a chain or earrings), you can consider replacing the material. Silver, ecological wooden crosses, and medical alloy are suitable for this.
For the child’s health, of course, the best and most correct option would be to exclude possible contact of the child’s delicate skin with metal, which causes such a reaction.

Perhaps, over time, the allergy to gold will cease to bother the child.

Traditional medicine therapy

Herbal remedies will not cure silver allergy, but are part of the treatment for silver contact dermatitis.

Article on the topic: Allergic contact dermatitis symptoms and treatment in adults

Decoctions, lotions and compresses, freshly squeezed drinks help relieve painful symptoms and alleviate the condition.

Allergy tests for allergies to silver

Used to relieve inflammatory symptoms:

celery root decoction - 1 tablespoon before breakfast and dinner;
apple, carrot, cabbage juice - three times a day, half an hour before meals, a teaspoon;
adding viburnum decoction to tea - three times a day;
the use of compresses with the juice of apples, cucumbers, carrots, potatoes;
washing the affected areas with decoctions of oak bark and St. John's wort.

How to treat gold allergy

The first stage of treating an allergic reaction to gold is to use special external agents.
Why? Based on numerous reviews, which confirm that the symptoms of an inadequate reaction are exclusively skin. That is why treatment must be appropriate and involve minimal intervention in the processes of the body that occur inside. So, the composition of the chosen product - cream, gel or ointment - should include the active ingredient antihistamine or corticosteroid. Only a doctor is obliged to prescribe treatment with one or another remedy based on medical history, as well as the degree of manifestation of allergy symptoms.

It is worth paying attention to Prednisolone and Hydrocortisone ointments, which will help to quickly cope with allergic manifestations. However, such drugs should be treated only after consultation and recommendation of a doctor.

It is important that if you have an ear allergy or after wearing gold earrings, you need to treat your earlobes and earrings with medical alcohol. If such a technique does not produce the desired result, it is strongly recommended to change the jewelry. Experts do not advise leaving your ears without jewelry, because if they are left for a long time, the holes will quickly become overgrown.

Lifehack for going to the cinema

Yesterday I was at the cinema, and this morning I saw this video and realized that this was a sign. I realized that it’s not me who is so irritable, but the problem of many people. Here is the video:

Every time going to the cinema is a great torment for me. It’s painful to hear someone crunching popcorn for the whole movie theater to hear, to hear someone slurping a straw in their glass, sucking out the remains of cola, to hear someone rustling something, someone opening their beer, someone talking to each other . If it were up to me, I would put librarians in cinemas who would shush every person who interferes with others’ watching a movie. But the market is the market, sales of popcorn and other “joys” that ordinary consumers cannot do without, this is an important source of income for cinemas and no changes can be expected.

Yesterday, while at the cinema, I was once again struggling with the oncoming affective state when suddenly an idea came to my head. I took out my headphones and inserted them into my ears:

All! Problem solved. The headphones perfectly cut out all the quiet (but intrusive sounds) of people eating, leaving only the loud sounds of a movie. While watching the movie, I even thought that the sounds had stopped and took out one earphone, but no, people continued to eat / rustle / slurp / squelch.

I hope my life hack will help irritable people like me.

Happy going to the cinema everyone.

Preventive measures for gold allergies

Of course, if a person has an allergic reaction to gold items, they must be removed immediately to eliminate the irritant and undergo appropriate treatment. In the future, as a preventative measure, you must follow the rules below:

It is good to clean your gold item just before you wear it for the first time.
If there are any damage to the skin (abrasions, scratches, wounds), it is necessary to carefully treat them using antiseptics, and avoid wearing rings or other jewelry for a certain time.
If you plan to do laundry, wash dishes, or do any other activity that involves contact of precious metal with water, organic and chemical substances, jewelry must be removed.

Diagnostics

Diagnosis of allergies is carried out using a skin patch test. For people with allergies, an epicutaneous skin strip containing provoking substances is glued to the back.

After 48 hours, the patch test is peeled off and attention is paid to how the patient reacts to a foreign object. If hyperemia or swelling is noticed at the site of contact with the provoking substance, an allergy is identified.

Important! Manifestations of allergies cannot be treated independently; to diagnose the condition, consultation with a specialist is necessary. Based on research and the individual characteristics of the patient’s body, the doctor will prescribe an effective treatment, since contact dermatitis is most often caused not by silver, but by the composition of various samples.

In some cases, allergies are provoked by a combination of metals; for this, a more detailed study is performed.

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