Hi Stephanie. Hopefully the condition has resolved by now. As a general rule of thumb, NEVER stop an antibiotic before the course is complete. This applies to an bacterial infectio. It is these incomplete courses of antibiotics that in part contributes to drug resistant bacteria. You may find that the bacteria may be difficult to treat with future courses if you do not complete the current course. The only time that you should consider doing so is if advised by a doctor.

Hi John

Yes, tufted folliculitis occurs on the scalp. You should speak to your doctor about the appropriate treatment. The infection will first need to be treated followed by topical applications to ease the other symptoms like itching.

I’d like to share my experience about my hair folliculitis. I’m 26 years old. I smoke around 10-15 sticks a day get drunk at least 2 times a week, and sleep around 4am till 11am in the morning. As you can see, I’m not really living a very healthy lifestyle. I tried to understand the causes and remedies of folliculitis. I have been under heavy oral medication before and have tried other methods in dealing with my problem – such as applying baking soda, manuka honey, vinegar, anti folliculitis shampoos, anti bacterial ointments and the likes. But unfortunately, it keeps coming back and back (prolly 30 times already for me within the span of 5 years)

I got so fed up using a lot of “unnatural” medication that i decided to just really find out about this sickness and try to come up with my own natural way of fighting it.

If you ever come across recurring folliculitis and or are tired of using oral medication then i think my advice might help you eradicate or at least contain the problem indefinitely.

Lets go back to the causes of folliculitis as shown on the article above and how it may have contributed to my having this sickness:

Folliculitis is more likely to occur in:

* Nasal staph carriers
– probably from excessive smoking
* Diabetes
– my mom has it but so far i’m no sweet tooth
* Dermatitis
– don’t really have this
* Obesity
– i was really obese before, i had around 28 percent body fat and was having bad palpitations at night that would wake me up
* Topical steroid treatment
-i never had this kind of treatment
* Lowered immunity (leukemia, AIDS)
-this is the main culprit as i will mention later on
* Acne treatment with tetracycline
-never head this kind of treatment
* Infants with tight clothes
-i rarely wear hats
* Athletes
-probably not hygenic (not taking a bath right after etc… so they tend to get folliculitis
* Hot humid climates
– i live in the philippines. Weather here is about 26-32 degrees. Quite hot.

As i mentioned earlier, i think my immunity is the real cause of the problem. One day, i just decided to really change my lifestyle. I smoke about 2 sticks a day, don’t drink anymore, sleep at around 10pm (wake up 7-8 hours after for work) and do cardio and lifting weights almost everyday (5-6 days alternate routines, soaking up 2 shirts with my sweat for every workout day). Another bad habits i changed was not smoking anymore after brushing my teeth. I think this contributes a lot especially when you drool in bed and all those chemicals left on your mouth sticks into your hair thru the drool.

Do you know those games wherein you upgrade your character to combat enemies with ease. Well i basically did that to help me combat this irritating problem.
Before, i probably had around 10 big bumps on my head and probably 30-40 pus along with it. Now i have around 1-2 bumps and no pus at all.

Smoking- this is very obvious. All those chemicals that go to your body really kills those good cells and poisons your body. Minimizing or better yet, quitting smoking helps your immunity and helps you intensify your workouts by giving you more energy to do it.

Alcohol- a few alcohol is ok (1 glass of wine a day as they say). But if you drink a lot, you also poison your liver and lower your immunity since you weaken yourself by excessive drinking.

Water- Lots of water (1 once per pound of body weight, or 2/3 ounce if your athletic) also helps in combating this problem. Do not take this for granted. Dehydration may contribute to dryness of skin while dryness of skin can also contributes to skin folliculitis. Moreover, you can’t allow all those toxins you ingested to be excreted if your body won’t allow you to perspire much. Your body is smart. Drink too little and it would save all that water. Drink too much and it’ll tell itself to excrete all that water. If you don’t drink enough, you won’t find yourself perspiring much when you workout – which is also important

Exercising – i remember telling all these to my dad and recall him saying ” well its the natural salt that comes out of your body that kills all those bacteria.” He had a point and my dermatologist had that look where a light bulb could be seen above her head. You not only excrete all those bad toxins you ingested by sweating, but you also kill the bacteria found on your head with your body’s salt.

Right eating- all my food now is boiled. I don’t drink colas or softdrinks and don’t eat food with sugar and too much sodium. A few drops of salt won’t hurt you’re diet as salt is still necessary for us. I not only lost weight but i also helped my body strengthen with all those veggies and clean meat i ingest.

Sleeping early- ok theres a clear difference when you sleep early and late even if the number of hours used to sleep is the same. Just notice how your mind and body reacts to those two scenarios. If i sleep early, i feel like brand new the next day, if i sleep late (even with the same amount of sleep) and wake up late, i feel weak and groggy the whole day. One of the reason is (from what i remember on the article i read) because you have hormonal imbalance. Remember how kids get their first pimple and we say its just your hormones. The same thing applies to us. The necessary hormones needed by our body for recovery are being made around 10pm-2am of our sleeping time. In short, your messing with your immune system again when you don’t sleep early.

Stress- i’m also a hot headed guy. But one thing i do to relieve myself of stress is to just take a moment and breathe. As much as possible, don’t use smoking as an excuse. I only smoke when i’m really REALLY really dying to have one. Get used to this practice and you will find yourself being able to be more patient in a lot of circumstances.

Hygiene- Always take a bath right after a workout. Don’t wait until 3 hours after to take a bath. If you think your heart has rested enough (around 20 mins after cooldown) then your ready to go. Flush out all those bacteria right away and don’t give them a chance to get into your pores. Remember, after your workout your pores are all open.

Cut your nails regularly to avoid getting germs and bacteria on it. This will even be more horrible if you use your long nails to scratch your head.

Dalton O,

I can’t say is it an ingrown hair or staphylococcal folliculitis. If it is a staph infection, it would be possible that it is caused by a strain of bacteria that are resistant to cephalexin and a different type of antibiotic would be needed. To confirm/exclude staph infection and to find the appropriate antibiotic, a sample of excretion from the rash would be required.

hkan,

if he gets better, he should continue with the antibiotics, as prescribed. If there will be no signs of improvement in few days, the liquid from the bumps should be probably tested for exact type of bacteria to see if some other antibiotic would be necessary.

sameer chaudhary,

do not in any case pinch the bumps with pus, since this may result in a life-threatening complications, like infection of the brain (encephalitis). If you can’t bear the pain, ask the doctor for painkillers. If you think antibiotics you’ve got do not work (there should be at least some improvement seen after few days), ask the doctor to take a sample from the rash to determine the exact subtype of bacteria and and to which exact antibiotics they are sensitive.