When I treat eczema I know the quantity and doses of the creams or oily creams that I use. In NHS practice GPs and dermatologists may only prescribe from a limited list of moisturisers, and for many years this was “aqueous cream”, now known to contain the allergen sodium lauryl sulphate, which aggravates eczema. This product is obviously no longer used, but it was recommended prescribing for more than five years.
So for a start, I am not too keen on being told which moisturiser I can use, I simply want the best available. Instead of separately prescribing a steroid cream and an antibiotic for staph, I mix these into the moisturiser, thoroughly, in the correct ratio for a skin flare, or for skin maintenance.
This is a compound formula. You may know it as the Aron regime, named after a prominent South African dermatologist, Dr Richard Aron. While I respect his work, and his popularising compound creams, he is not the first dermatologist to name a formula after himself.
There is another dermatologist, who was a prominent professor in America, called Dr Kligman. He named a specific formula after himself - Kligman’s formula for hyper-pigmentation, or melasma. It was a skin lightening cream, and extremely useful. However time moves on, and better agents come along which replace older medications. In this case, because one of the ingredients can be harmful.
So, I use the name compound cream, which simply means that the cream is made up of specific ratios of the important elements or ingredients. I want my dermatology patients to use each of the agents, and in very specific quantities or concentrations, so I weight everything.
The result is often that there is usually a compound for skin flares of eczema, when the ingredients need to be stronger, and a maintenance cream, which is a larger tub of cream to be used every day.
