What is Excessive Sweating (Hyperhidrosis)?

Excessive work of sweat glands is called hyperhidrosis in medical language.

Under normal conditions, our body secretes up to 1 milliliter of sweat per square meter per minute, whereas in hyperhidrosis, the amount of sweating can go up to 40 times.

Watch out if you sweat for no reason!

Hyperhydrosis patients do not need to move or have an excessively high ambient temperature to sweat. Even where they sit, sweat can drip from their hands.

Why Do We Sweat?

Sweating is a physiological mechanism required to regulate body temperature during exercise, hot or cold weather. In addition, an increase in sweating can be seen in stress and excitement situations.

What are the Symptoms of Excessive Sweating?

Moist or cold hands and feet to the ankles, regardless of the ambient temperature. During stress or any other effect, abundant sweat dripping from the fingertips.

Places where excessive sweating is common

• Hand and Foot Sweating

Underarm Sweating

What Are The Complications Due To Excessive Sweating?

Hyperhydrosis is not a health-damaging condition. However, especially in summer, if enough water and minerals are not taken, salt and water loss, in other words dehydration symptoms, may occur.

Skin irritations and itching can be seen. Some people, on the other hand, may affect their education, work or social life, and their psychological status.

What are the Causes of Excessive Sweating?

Although the exact cause is not known, primary hyperhidrosis is due to a nervous system disorder and a family history is observed in most of the cases.

Sweating can also be seen due to conditions such as gout, tuberculosis, diabetes, metabolic diseases and overactivity of the thyroid gland.

How Is Excessive Sweating Diagnosed?

Diagnosis is made by physical examination. Since the symptoms of the disease are peculiar, diagnosis is not difficult.

However, it is important to distinguish hyperthyroidism from other diseases that cause excessive sweating, such as diabetes, hypertension and pheochromocytoma, which is a hormonal disease.

In such diseases, sweating is not only in the form of armpit sweating, foot and hand sweating, but mostly throughout the body.

What are the symptoms of excessive sweating?

In order to be diagnosed with primary regional hyperhidrosis, the patient should have the following symptoms in addition to regional and excessive sweating for at least 6 months:

• Having a sweating attack at least once a week

• Sweating being symmetrical

• Sweating level disrupts the quality of life

• Occurred before the age of 25

• Having a family history

• No sweating during sleep

Excessive sweating can cause psychological and social problems as it disturbs people a lot. However, fungal infections are also common in areas that sweat excessively.

How to Treat Excessive Sweating?

Drug treatments, antiperspirant ointments and sprays, iontophoresis treatment, botulinum toxin (botox) injection and surgical treatment are the methods used today for excessive sweating.

Medication treatments

Oral or systemic prescription medications are sometimes used in the treatment of hyperhidrosis. Some of these are anticholinergics, beta blockers and clonidine hydrochloride.

Although it is thought that such drugs can limit general sweating by inhibiting the stimulation of the sweat glands in theory, their long-term use is not recommended due to their serious side effects.

Antiperspirant ointments and sprays

Ointments, sprays and solutions can be effective for mild sweating. Generally, solutions containing aluminum salts applied at night, sprays can be used. However, it may have side effects such as skin staining, irritation, and allergic reaction. Due to its low effect rate and duration, it is not preferred frequently today.

Iontophoresis treatment

It is applied by applying low voltage electric current to the skin. It is especially effective on the hands. It requires long-term treatment. It cannot be applied to patients with epilepsy, pregnant women and those with pacemakers. Effects such as redness, pain and burning may occur on the skin.

Excessive Sweating Treatment with Botox (Botulinum toxin treatment)

In order to prevent excessive sweating caused by many different reasons under the armpits, hands and feet, the toxin treatment method has become quite common today.

This method is applied by applying a small amount of toxin injection (botox) to areas that are active in sweating (2-3 mm below the skin). It acts by temporarily blocking the nerve endings that stimulate the sweat glands in the area.

Sweating treatment with Botox has no side effects.

With this method, the sweating function in the body either ends or needs to be repeated after 6-8 months. Immediately after the procedure, the person can return to his normal, daily life and see the result of the procedure he has done within 3-4 days.

Surgical treatment

Endoscopic thoracic sympathectomy method is used especially in the hand and armpit area.

The sympathetic nerves that cause excessive sweating by working too much are cut or removed and there is no reversal.

In some cases, the sympathetic chain and its branches can be cautiously burned or clamped with clips. Since these nerves have no function other than sweating, the surgery does not have paralysis, loss of sensation, and reflex impairment.