For those affected by hyperhidrosis and excessive sweating interfering with their everyday life, there are effective treatment options available.
- Long lasting and extra effective antiperspirants with aluminum chloride. First and foremost it is important to distinguish between deodorants and antiperspirants. Deodorants normally contain perfume to mask the smell of sweat. They could also contain substances that reduces the amount of bacteria, which also prevents bad smell. However, Deodorants do not prevent the sweating itself.
Antiperspirants on the other hand prevent sweating where applied. There are long-lasting antiperspirants especially suited for people with hyperhidrosis and none that lasts longer than Absolute Dry. Absolute Dry stops sweating where applied for up to 7 days. It can be used for different kinds of sweating, e.g. for underarms, hands, feet and larger skin areas. - Injections with Botox. Injection treatment work locally and are primarily used to treat hands, feet, armpits and other defined areas of the skin, not for general sweating across the body. The effective time span varies, but normally amounts to between 4 and 12 months.
- Pharmaceutical treatment with antichollinergic tablets, often in combination with infections or Absolute Dry. For people with generalized hyperhidrosis, pharmaceutical treatment with tablets can be very helpful, offering systemic rather than local effect.
- Microwave thermolysis A relatively new form of treatment, so far used only for treatment of excessive sweating in the underarm area. The sweat glands are destroyed by the microwave energy directed at them.
- Surgery. Surgery used to be more or less the only treatment option for hyperhidrosis, but today it is rather uncommon and only used where other treatments have proven insufficient and the sweating is very opressive. The most common hyperhidrosis surgery aims to remove the sweat glands in the armpits, thereby putting a stop to excessive underarm perspiration.
- Iontophoresis has been used since the 1940s but is relatively uncommon today. It is used primarily to treat hands and feet, with the best efficacy for hands. A medical device is used to pass a mild electrical current through water and through the skin’s surface of for example hands placed in the shallow pan. This current effects the sweat glands and has the potential to reduce sweat production.
