Warts in children: why they appear and how to get rid of them

Human papillomavirus

Humans cannot become infected from animals. “If a child touched a frog or toad, and then warts appeared on the child’s hands, this is just a coincidence,” says dermatovenerologist Svetlana Yakubovskaya . The causative agent of this infection, which leads to the appearance of such unaesthetic guests on the skin, is HPV - human papillomavirus. And no other.

According to research, today it is the most common infection on the planet. More than 70% of the world's population is infected with it. The peculiarity of HPV is that it does not always manifest itself. As a rule, we are dealing with disruptions in the immune system (weakened due to illness, unbalanced diet or unhealthy regime). If the immune guards let the virus “to the surface”, warts appear - unpleasant rashes that quickly spread over the skin and sometimes cause discomfort.

In this case, discomfort is most likely to occur if parents try to remove a wart for a child at home without expert advice.

The mechanism of the appearance of warts in children

Warts occur as a result of the influence of a virus on the bodies of children with weakened immune systems. Before removing growths from a child’s face, hands, and feet, you should find the cause of their appearance. HPV is transmitted through contact with an infected person. Characterized by a long incubation period. The pathogen manifests itself during stress, during hormonal changes, after illness, as a result of a lack of minerals, vitamins, and microelements. Removal of elements should be carried out only after consulting a doctor.

The virus that gets on the skin of children is integrated into the cellular genome and remains dormant for a long time. Under favorable conditions, it is activated, changes the structure of the genetic material, and provokes the growth of elements.

Doctors distinguish several types of warts, which have a variety of shapes, colors and sizes. Common categories of childhood education are presented in the table.

External manifestations

HPV rashes can be large or tiny, intrusive and disruptive, or go unnoticed. They are typical for people of any age and gender. And they do not give discounts to children, teenagers or pregnant women.

With warts, self-infection often occurs - when the rashes are spread throughout the body by the patient themselves: if they are scratched, touched, not maintained by hygiene and not treated. For example, it all starts with a tiny dot on a leg or arm, and in the end we see warts on a child’s face and then we sound the alarm. “Children often begin to pick and tear apart elements, which will contribute to the spread of infection,” comments Dr. Yakubovskaya.

Traditional methods of treatment

You can fight isolated warts using folk methods. However, it should be borne in mind that their effectiveness is lower. To achieve a significant effect, the duration of treatment will have to be increased. The following are used as folk remedies:

• Celandine juice . Using a pipette, the growth is generously watered with healing liquid 2 times a day. The course of treatment is 3 weeks.
• Compresses made from aloe and Kalanchoe leaves. The raw materials are crushed in a blender. The resulting paste is laid out on cellophane, a compress is applied to the affected area and secured with a bandage. Pre-steaming the wart in soda water enhances the effect of the compress. Duration – 3 weeks.

Compresses are made from raw grated potatoes and garlic in the same way. When preparing the composition, it is important to grate the ingredients separately. Bandages are applied overnight.

Treatment of human papillomavirus

The paradox is that warts can be cured, but HPV cannot. Today there is not a single product with proven effectiveness that could completely rid the host of the virus. There are medications that prevent HPV activity. In addition, it is enough for the doctor to explain to you exactly how to remove warts from children.

“The main thing to remember is that HPV and warts appear when the immune system is reduced. So if you want to avoid this, keep your immunity level. Of course, normal hygiene is always important: your own towel and bed linen. Also, don’t touch other people’s skin rashes.”

Risk factors for the activation of the virus on the skin may include “nutrition, the presence of concomitant pathologies, such as diabetes, hormonal changes, especially in adolescence.”

Prevention

One of the main stages in the fight against warts is the prevention of their subsequent appearance. If they grow once, the risk of relapse increases several times. To prevent the occurrence of new papillomas, parents should pay attention to the child’s hygiene and increase his immunity.

Prevention measures:

1. Avoid using shared hygiene items. The baby must have his own towel, bed linen, washcloth, nail clippers and other personal items.
2. Strengthen immunity. To do this, you need to lead an active lifestyle, walk in the fresh air more often, and eat right.
3. In the autumn-winter period, with the permission of the doctor, you can take immunostimulating drugs.
4. Do not contact a person who already has warts on their body.
5. Wash your hands regularly and practice overall body hygiene.
6. Choose clothes made from natural materials, especially underwear.

Also, removal of existing papillomas becomes a kind of preventive measure. This action prevents the spread of the virus to other parts of the body. Therefore, if parents observe warts appearing on their child’s skin again and again, they should immediately contact a dermatologist.

Vaccine and warts

The HPV vaccine is widespread throughout the world. However, it is not intended to protect you from infection. The drug is aimed at preventing the development of types of HPV that are dangerous from an oncological point of view, leading, for example, to cervical cancer.

Vaccination is indicated, depending on the type of drug, for people from 9 to 45 years old, both boys and girls. Even if you are already a carrier, getting vaccinated will be beneficial and may be your chance to prevent cancer caused by HPV. It is most effective to get vaccinated before you become sexually active.

Removing warts

The doctor intervenes during the disease only if it causes discomfort. In children, as a rule, a wait-and-see approach is chosen. If the child is not bothered by the wart, then it can go away naturally within an average of 6-7 months, and sometimes earlier.

If it causes pain, a dermatologist can remove the wart for your child. This procedure is performed by a cosmetologist; rashes are usually removed with liquid nitrogen. In addition to mechanical effects, the treatment of warts in children is carried out with special solutions with various acids and other chemical components. But their composition is powerful and they are not recommended for children.

For example, “if a plantar wart in a child is bothering you, then in children a wait-and-see approach is possible if the rash does not cause any discomfort,” explains Svetlana. And he adds that “we must not forget that there are no drugs that are safe for children and are intended to simply “raise or strengthen” the immune system, which is often what parents want.”

Liquid nitrogen - all the pros and cons

Many doctors recommend cauterizing a wart for children using liquid nitrogen. Cryodestruction is the effect on formation using low temperatures, freezing tissue and destroying it.

Liquid nitrogen has been used in medicine for more than 50 years and is very popular

It is strictly contraindicated to cauterize a child’s warts with nitrogen:

• with individual sensitivity to nitrogen;
• in the presence of epileptic seizures;
• with high blood pressure;
• in the presence of inflammatory processes around the formation;
• during the course of colds or viral diseases;

Note. There is a high probability that additional removal of the formation will be necessary. In some cases, doctors have to conduct several cauterization sessions with liquid nitrogen in order to completely rid the patient of growths.

Among the advantages, doctors name:

• availability of the procedure in terms of price and availability of special equipment;
• short duration. To cauterize a child’s warts, 1 minute is enough;
• fast healing;
• minimal risk of developing scars and marks on the body.

It is important to know! To prevent the child from being afraid of the procedure for removing warts with liquid nitrogen, local anesthesia is recommended.

Ways of infection with the virus

The most obvious way to become the owner of warts is through contact with someone who has them. However, here too your immunity will play a decisive role. In addition, it is possible to transmit HPV from mother to child during childbirth. For example, if the birth is natural, and the mother’s condylomas have not been removed.

If a woman has HPV, she should first of all take care of a healthy pregnancy. Since the virus can interfere with the attachment of the fetus and disrupt the course of intrauterine development.

You can protect yourself from the virus by observing hygiene standards, as well as avoiding visiting public places if you have damaged skin. For example, you should not go to the pool with wounds and abrasions.

Given the prevalence of the virus, it is impossible to be completely confident in any measures to prevent infection. At the same time, according to 2021 data, more than 7.5 billion people live on the planet, which means that there are more than 2 billion who have not been infected with HPV. It turns out that there is still a chance not to become a carrier of the virus. Doctors do not recommend examinations if there are no symptoms and unless, for example, your partner insists on it.

It is worth remembering that HPV does not necessarily mean warts. In children, the reasons for getting this unpleasant skin disease are the same as in adults.

Main types

Doctors know more than one type of wart. The reason is the existence of several types of papilloma viruses.

Vulgar growths

Most often they appear in children of preschool and school age. They can be recognized by their shape. They look like a spherical segment. The hemisphere rises above the surface of the epidermis. It has a flesh or yellow color with a grayish tint.

The longer the growth is present on the skin, the darker it becomes. Most often, the back of the hand gets dusted. First, single growths appear near the nail plates or on the sides of the fingers. This is the motherboard.

Subsequently, small nodes form around it. Sometimes they are compressed and combined into one neoplasm with a diameter of 1.5 centimeters. Vulgar warts have a rough surface and a dense structure.

Palmoplantar growths appear on the palms and fingertips. Doctors draw the attention of parents to their similarity to calluses. Dense growths grow deep into the skin and affect nerve endings. Therefore, children experience pain.

Juvenile warts

They grow on the back of the hands. They have clear boundaries, round shape, light brown or yellow color. The head of the growth is soft.

It rises above the dermis and resembles a pimple. Sometimes flat calluses cause subcutaneous itching. The appearance of a plantar wart is accompanied by the formation of a complex of aesthetic imperfections.

Unusual flow

During the course of the human papillomavirus, unusual variants are also possible. For example, if infected through the mother's condylomas during childbirth, the baby may be affected by wart rashes in the upper respiratory tract.

“In children, this is manifested by difficulty speaking, hoarseness, hoarseness of the voice, and in extremely rare and severe cases, even difficulty breathing. Of course, these are not common situations and, as a rule, they are diagnosed during an examination by an ENT specialist.” The solution to the problem is invasive; warts are removed from the affected areas.

Another atypical scenario for the development of events with HPV is Lewandowski-Lutz disease. This kind of deviation can be described as hypersensitivity to the virus. Epidermodysplasia verruciformis manifests itself as large-scale rashes and growths throughout the body.

Treatment here requires complex and different from usual. This type of HPV development is inherited, that is, it is determined by its genetic predisposition - the presence of this form in one or both parents. The disease has been little studied and appears extremely rarely compared to ordinary warts. It cannot be a consequence of the development of warts in an ordinary person who is not genetically prone to this. Risk factors for this form of HPV are HIV and immunodeficiency, as well as organ transplantation.

When to go to the doctor

Parents should take their child to the doctor for any rash. As Dr. Komarovsky says, “with everything for the first time, you need to see a doctor.” Delayed treatment may worsen the situation.

For example, there is no actual difference between warts in children and adolescents. But first-time mothers are most often actively monitored by a pediatrician, monitoring the condition of the skin and hygiene, diet and diet. Therefore, statistically, warts in children most often go away easily. At the same time, it is more difficult to persuade a teenager to visit a doctor; it is not always possible to see the condition of the skin and impose a regimen. Therefore, even if the picture is the same initially, the affected areas in adolescents may ultimately be wider, treatment more complicated, and the course more unpleasant.

If you notice strange rashes, the easiest way is to seek the opinion of a specialist. Even a wart on a child’s leg can become a big problem if self-medicated. Warts do not have “false twins” and if it is HPV, the doctor is guaranteed to determine this, and then together you can choose tactics to eliminate the problem.

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Experts: Svetlana Yakubovskaya

Types of warts on the hands and what they look like (photo): viral, small filamentous on the fingers, dry

One of the most common skin diseases are benign formations, warts . They are a type of viral infection that affects any part of the body, but most often the face, arms, legs, and nails.

Today we will talk about what they are and what types of warts on the hands are, photos, how to diagnose them and how to treat them.

There are several types of warts , each of which has its own causes and methods of treatment.

Photo

You can see what warts on your hands look like in the photo:

Dry

This type is also popularly called vulgar warts .
They are represented by an uneven, cone-shaped fleecy skin growth, usually gray-brown in color. Dry warts are dangerous because they can cause pain and even lead to bleeding.

They grow to a fairly large size - 1.5 cm and can merge into clusters of skin deformities, which already becomes a pathology that is difficult to treat.

reasons for the occurrence of dry viral warts on the hands, but the most common is the presence of the papilloma virus in the human blood. The virus can strike in several cases:

• When shaking hands or other contact with an infected person;
• Through things that have been touched by an infected person (towels, handrails on a bus, etc.);
• The virus penetrates especially quickly through microscopic damage to the skin (scratches, cracks, inflammation, cuts).

REFERENCE: As shown by studies conducted by the American scientific community in 2011, carriers of the HPV papilloma virus , and many people do not even suspect that they carry a hidden disease within themselves, which for the time being may remain in a frozen state , and in case of overheating, hypothermia or other factors, awaken and develop into a painful form.
As a rule, dry warts on the fingers are treated with medications.

Modern drug treatment is represented by a wide variety of chemical drugs.
ATTENTION: Read the instructions for the products very carefully before use; as a rule, they contain alkalis and acids.
Avoid contact with healthy areas of the body and especially eyes.

Keep away from children and animals.

• Soliderm . A potent drug consisting of a mixture of lactic, oxalic, nitric and acetic acids. The drug is used only as prescribed by a doctor.
• Verrucacid . It is a combination of phenol and metacresol. The powerful, caustic composition breaks down the wart. But getting the solution on a healthy area of ​​skin will cause an instant burn.
• Super clean .
  This remedy is the most common, effective and, at the same time, inexpensive. Its price varies from 20 to 30 rubles. Supercleaner consists of sodium alkali, it perfectly breaks down both papillomas and viral warts on the fingers, but again, it is important to treat skin areas very carefully, avoiding getting the product on undamaged areas. If sharp pain occurs, you should immediately rinse the skin with running water and lubricate it with anti-burn ointment.

Flat (youth)

This type of skin growth can affect any part of the body: face, legs, but especially often, fingers.
They are represented by small warts on the hands (no more than 5 mm), growths in the form of flat nodules of pinkish or brown tints.

As a rule, skin deformations appear in adolescents during puberty with a sharp hormonal imbalance. Among all existing ones, they are the easiest to treat.

Warts occur due to stress, hypothermia or sunstroke, or failure of the hormonal and endocrine systems.

Flat warts can be treated well with both medication and folk remedies.

Traditional methods of treatment include lotions made from onion or garlic juice, or Kalanchoe juice.

recipes , and here a person chooses based on personal preferences and lack of intolerance to a particular product.

Filiform

Filiform warts are small growths, in most cases affecting the fingers, reaching a size of 4-6 mm.
Important! The danger of the filamentous type is that the slightest disruption of the wart thread leads to the appearance of several similar lesions at once.
reasons for the appearance of thread-like growths:

• Frequent wearing of tight clothing or shoes made of non-natural, synthetic materials;
• Microscopic injuries;
• Hereditary factor.

Whatever the reason, it is necessary to consult a dermatologist who will prescribe competent, consistent treatment.
First, it is necessary to recognize a wart , understand that it is this particular disease, and not, for example, a mole, cellular carcinomas or epidermal nevus.

After all, if warts can be removed in one way or another, then moles should not be touched under any circumstances, otherwise it can lead to very serious consequences, including severe bleeding or even cancer.

Also, epidermal nevus and other serious dermatological diseases require a completely different therapeutic approach, and missing treatment time can lead to irreversible consequences.
Important! You should not rely only on the external signs of a wart (color, shape, sometimes itching), because other skin diseases have similar symptoms.
Diagnosis is carried out by dermatologists, who conduct a series of studies, based on the results of which a diagnosis is made, and according to it - competent treatment. Usually a histological examination : fragments of the wart are taken, which give a 100% accurate diagnosis. Dermatologists often refer patients for an HPV test, which includes a blood test and a dermatological test.

In cases where the doctor doubts whether it is a wart or a malignant formation, a biopsy . This is a painful procedure, but it gives an accurate picture of the disease to within a thousandth of a percent. When it comes to human health, any mistake can be fatal.

If the study has proven the presence of a filamentous wart, then either drug treatment or procedural treatment is prescribed. In advanced cases, surgical intervention is suggested, a section that is performed under local anesthesia.

Nail area

This type of growth is often confused with nail fungus , which slows down the treatment process: antifungal agents have no effect on slowing down the growth of warts,

whereas action here needs to be taken urgently in order to avoid the development of the disease to the pathological stage, in which all nails and the surrounding nail space are affected and destroyed.

The causes of the disease lie in disorders of the hormonal and immune systems. Nail warts also appear upon contact with a source of infection or when hygiene rules are violated.

The treatment is quite lengthy and includes both a procedural stage and a medicinal one.

Senile keratomas (seborrheic keratosis)

Unfortunately, no person over fifty years of age is protected from the occurrence of this disease.
If the previous types are associated with a viral infection in the body, then keratomas arise for completely different reasons , the main of which is internal imbalance, a decrease in the immune system, changes in the hormonal and endocrine systems.

Keratomas can develop on any part of the body, but most often on the cheekbones, eyelids, and hands. People prone to seborrheic keratosis should avoid direct sunlight, overheating, as well as hypothermia, and stress.

Otherwise , the warts increase in size and new growths appear. Keratomas look like loose keratinized lesions, gray, brown, and less often black.

Keratomas can be easily removed using folk remedies ; in particular, onion juice .
But still, treatment should be carried out under the supervision of a dermatologist. WARNING: Never try to cut off warts yourself.
At best, this will lead to a sharp increase in formation and the appearance of new ones, at worst - to bleeding or cancer. Now you know what danger warts pose. Don't delay treatment. And finally, all we can do is wish you health and goodness!

To learn more about the types of warts on the hands, you can watch the video:

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