What Causes Urticaria?

Posted on Mon, 2 Jun 2014

Medically reviewed by Ask A Doctor - 24x7 Medical Review Team

Mon, 2 Jun 2014 Answered on

Mon, 23 Jun 2014 Last reviewed on

Question : My daughter is 3yr., no known allergies, is overall very healthy. She developed the skin problem two days ago as seen in the attached photos and its gotten worse. She says it neither hurts nor itches. Recent changes include: horse-fly bite on her back about same time, gave her canned soup, we recently put in a pool (N2 purified). No family history of excema. Very concerned, please help!

Answered by Dr. Dr. Kakkar (18 minutes later)

Brief Answer:
Urticaria; cetrizine syp

Detailed Answer:
Hello and welcome to healthcaremagic

I would keep a possibility of Acute Urticaria. It presents as skin welts/swellings, which can be distributed all over the body. Itching is subjective in individuals.

It is most likely due to intake of canned soup, which usually contains food preservatives and food additives.

Urticaria OR hives can occur due to various causes like(to name a few):
--Infections(bacterial, viral, fungal)
--Drugs(Pain killers/ antibiotics etc)
--Certain foods and food additives/preservatives
--Physical Urticaria: Cold temperature, Heat, Pressure(Prolonged Standing, Sitting), Dermographism etc.
--Cholinergic Urticaria: in response to strong emotions, exercise, spicy food etc ---Autoimmune disorders like SLE, RA etc.
--A few cases have no underlying cause and are known as idiopathic urticaria.

Treatment: An oral antihistamine like cetrizine syp 5mg/5ml once daily for a week would be suitable for her.

A topical soothing lotion like calamine would help her symptomatically.

take care
regards

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Above answer was peer-reviewed by : Dr. Chakravarthy Mazumdar