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It's important to know that dermatitis is not catching, so it can't be passed around, it can be developed at anytime during your career. Some people can be seriously affected by it, and other might not get it at all, everyone is different. There are typically two types of dermatitis: irritant contact dermatitis and allergic contact dermatitis. Each type is different, so it's important to identify your dermatitis so you know how to handle it appropriately.
Irritant contact dermatitis can occur if you've been in contact with strong chemicals such as bleach. This can become common especially among hairdressers, as it is common for it to develop very gradually through recurrent wet work with milder chemicals, such as shampoo - a chemical often encountered when working within hairdressing. Washing people's hair regularly can sometimes cause dermatitis to occur over time.
Allergic contact dermatitis often develops quite quickly after minor contact with substances such as shampoos or colouring agents. It's not infrequent for this kind of allergy to take months or sometimes years to fully develop. Unfortunately, once you develop the allergy, you will be allergic for the rest of your life. This can happen at anytime, even if you have had no problems in your career before. With allergic dermatitis, the things you are allergic to when working can also affect you when you're at home, such as household cleaners or shampoo.
Dermatitis is mainly caused by frequent wet working, so hairdressers are most at risk of developing it, especially if they spend prolonged periods of time in contact with water throughout the day. Another main cause is a lot of the chemicals in hairdressing products, such as shampoos, colours, bleaches or even the products you use to clean up afterwards. You can also suffer with it if you handle chemical soaked equipment, touching contaminated clothing, tools or containers, aerosols or even dust landing on your skin and the surfaces that you touch.
Dermatitis can be prevented, and there are a range of different things you can do in order to wave goodbye to bad hands. First, wear disposable, non-latex gloves if you spend a lot of time colouring, shampooing, bleaching or rinsing hair, this will protect your hands and always change gloves between clients. Always dry your hands thoroughly when you come into contact with water, use a paper towel or a soft cotton towel to ensure that all the moisture has been soaked up.
It is also very important to use a top quality combined moisturising and skin protection cream. Ensure whichever product you use is waterproof and is formulated to be used inside gloves. Use your preferred cream as recommended by the manufacturer and, if possible have the same cream at home as well where it will be most effective when used nightly before bed.
It's surprisingly simple to prevent dermatitis to occur if you are a hair dresser, simply by using disposable gloves, drying your hands properly, and using a good quality, waterproof combined moisturiser and skin protection cream. You may think it's too simple to work, but 74% of hairdressers said that they could still handle their clients hair freely, and that they would use them for wet work in the future, so if you suffer from dermatitis, take the appropriate steps to help ease the pain and prevent it from coming back.
