Hyperhidrosis

Hyperhidrosis is a condition that causes excessive sweating. While hyperhidrosis does not pose a serious threat to health, it can cause significant emotional and psychological distress, embarrassment and can have a negative impact on a person’s quality of life.

Types of hyperhidrosis

There are two types of hyperhidrosis:
•focal hyperhidrosis, where only certain parts of the body are affected, such as the armpits, hands, feet or face, and
•generalised hyperhidrosis, where the entire body is affected.

Hyperhidrosis can also be either:
•primary idiopathic hyperhidrosis, where there is no apparent cause for the excessive sweating, and
•secondary hyperhidrosis, where the excessive sweating is the result of an underlying health condition, such as an overactive thyroid gland.

Most cases of focal hyperhidrosis are primary. Generalised hyperhidrosis is usually secondary.

How common is hyperhidrosis?

Hyperhidrosis is fairly common. An estimated 3% of people in England (1.53 million) are affected.
Primary hyperhidrosis typically begins during the teenage years or early adulthood (between 20 and 25). It affects men and women equally.
Secondary hyperhidrosis can begin at any age and depends on the underlying health condition.

What to do?

Perhaps the biggest challenge in treating hyperhidrosis is that so many people are reluctant to seek medical advice, either because of embarrassment or a mistaken belief that nothing can be done to improve their symptoms.
However, the outlook for hyperhidrosis is good and there is a range of different treatments that have proved effective in controlling symptoms.

Symptoms of hyperhidrosis

Hyperhidrosis is defined as sweating more than is needed to keep your body temperature regulated.
There is no precise measure of how much sweat is ‘normal’, but if you feel you sweat excessively and it has started to interfere with your normal daily activities and social life, you may have hyperhidrosis.
Hyperhidrosis can interfere with normal activities in a number of ways and someone with the condition may:
•be reluctant to shake hands or have other physical contact,
•be reluctant to take part in recreational activities for fear they will make the sweating worse, or
•become socially withdrawn and self-consciousness.

The most common areas of the body affected by focal hyperhidrosis are the armpits, feet, palms and face.
Most people with hyperhidrosis have at least one episode of excessive sweating a week.

For reasons that are not fully understood, people with primary hyperhidrosis do not usually experience sweating at night.

Is hyperhidrosis always inherited?

No. However in almost 50% of recorded cases there is a family history of hyperhidrosis. When a person is born with this condition he or she has primary hyperhidrosis while if hyperhidrosis develops as a result of another medical condition such as menopause or hyperthyroidism it is called secondary hyperhidrosis. In the latter instance the sweating is usually spread across larger areas of the body and not localized as in the case of primary hyperhidrosis.

Can hyperhidrosis be treated?

Yes. Increasingly there are a number of available options to treat if not permanently cure hyperhidrosis. These options range from oral medication to surgery and non surgical injections such as Botox.

How is Botox used to treat hyperhidrosis?

Botox a product manufactured by the California-based pharmaceutical company Allergan Inc. from botulinum toxin is injected into the area in which excessive sweating occurs and stops sweating by temporary blocking the nerve endings in that area and thus decreasing the transmission to the sweat glands. The effect of a Botox injection typically lasts 6-10 months after which a repeat injection needs to be administered.

 

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