Bleach for eczema?

For children who suffer from eczema, relief may be as close as the nearest laundry closet.

Researchers said Monday that adding a small amount of bleach to a child's bath water significantly reduced problems associated with the skin disease. Eczema is a chronic condition that can cause children serious distress, as well as absences from school.

In response to the irritation and itchiness, children often scratch themselves until their skin is crusty and raw.

The researchers tried using bleach because they believed it might work against the bacteria that play a role in the disease, said the senior author of the study, Dr Amy S Paller of the Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern. (The lead author is Dr Jennifer T Huang, now of the University of Colorado in Denver.)

Eczema is often treated with antibiotics, but the more they are used, the more they contribute to the problem of resistant bacteria. 

For the study, which appears in the journal Pediatrics, researchers took two groups of children with eczema, ages 6 months to 17 years, and asked that they be bathed in either plain water or in water with about half a cup of bleach. The study found big improvements among the children who had the bleach baths, but only on the body, not the face, because they were not submerging their heads. Children who take the baths should close their eyes and mouths and put their heads in the water, too, the researchers said.

Age reminders undermine memory

Older people who believe that memory loss goes hand in hand with aging may be undermining their own performance, a new study says.

Researchers found that when older volunteers took a series of cognitive tests after being given hints that their age might affect the results, they scored lower. The study, which appears in Experimental Aging Research, was led by Thomas M. Hess of North Carolina State University. The researchers worked with about 100 adults in two age groups, 60 to 70 and 71 to 82. Participants were asked to do a series of tasks involving arithmetic and memorisation.

For some test-takers, the researchers set out to plant in their minds the idea that their age might affect their performance. They told them the test was being used to examine the effects of age on memory. They also asked the volunteers to write down their age right before taking the test. The study found that members of this group did worse than those in the other group. This was especially the case for the 60- to 70-year-olds. The explanation may be that these participants, newly getting used to the idea of being "older," were more susceptible to suggestions that their age might make them do worse.