Have a new worry this week! Luckily it isn't a huge one, for once. Maybe it'll go away on its own. My husbands hands and feet are cracking pretty badly with extremely dry skin. Looks like he's covered in paper cuts on his hands and feet, although those areas are not being radiated (just the mouth/face, of course.) His skin is usually super oily, but not during all this radiation. He's walking with a limp now due to an extremely deep dry skin cut on his heel.

He puts on lotion 2x a day MINIMUM. He likes aveeno since it's been gifted at the cancer center- now he buys only aveeno-- aveeno soap, aveeno colloidal oatmeat bath packets, aveeno shaving gel-- aveeno aveeno aveeno!

He's drinking a lot of water but every day his skin gets more dry and cracked and painful.

Is this common & how long does it take after radiation for this symptom to go away? His doctor told us what he's doing now is fine and to wait it out, but it's driving him nuts. Which drives me nuts. The deepness and the number of cuts look very painful.

I suggest asking the doc for some prescription creams and letting the doc know about this issue. They will work better than most of the over the counter ones. I used Beta-Val cream which was great. Pick up some spa socks and gloves too. Your husband might resist but insist! These are specially treated gloves and socks that he can lotion up and put on then go to sleep with them on. This should help resolve the extra dry cracked skin on his hands and feet quickly.

If he hasnt already been using cream on his neck areas then you probably want to begin doing so very soon. Beta-Val works great but there are many others including aquaphor (over the counter) that will do the job too. Immediately after rads, pat the cream onto his neck and allow it to soak in. Reapply at one or 2 more times during the day. Make certain to NEVER lotion up anything above the shoulders before heading to rads. That can cause big issues.

Good luck!!!

Ahh he tells me he thinks the skin cracking issues are probably from chemo. He's probably right. With shingles and the erbutux rash I just wasn't even thinking.. Well, anyway..!

Christine *thank you!* He LOVES beauty treatments and is ordering spa gloves and socks from amazon right now. Right up his alley!

He's very excited about getting beauty gloves.. oh man lol. He's using something called Durham's Wonder Salve on himself, too. I think it's hokey and would prefer to get a script or use aquaphor buut.. I can only encourage so much THANK YOU again. He really paid attention when I told him you suggested it!

Glad you found some answers, and I suffered that also with two different chemo treatments. I was going to say it sounded like Erbitux or Taxtore, which can cause hand and foot syndrome. Another item I was told to use by a chemo nurse was crazy glue on the cuts to seal, tree tea oil, but that smelled too much like terpentine. I used bandaids instead on my fingertips, and Aquophor or Cetaphil, under the socks, gloves. Does he have shingles or a question the rash is? Anyway, I had shingles 4 months after radiation, which is one of the worst pains. There is a vaccine for shingles, and heard, I'm not sure, you can get it again even though you had it.

Have you looked into silver sulfadiazine? Old fashioned stuff but it worked miracles for me. You need a scrip for it but I highly recommend it for deep burns. Dunno about cracking but worth asking your docs.

Hang in there!

Audite, if you order from Amazon, PLEASE go thru the green Amazon box on the main forum page. This helps OCF by giving back a small percentage of any purchase. Its not much but those few cents do add up and help to keep OCF running. Please click on the green Amazon box whenever you buy anything from Amazon. With holiday shopping right around the corner pass this along to friends and relatives too.

Thank you!!!


PS.... Im very glad your husband was able to use my tips. I wear spa socks every single night to bed and they are wonderful!!!!!