Rash from Neosporin

I burned myself cooking 2 weeks ago. The burns themselves weren't too bad because I attended to them quickly. I applied a burn relieving gel to them immediately to relieve the pain and to stop the burn progression. The next day, I started to apply neosporin to keep it from getting infected. Instead, I broke into a huge rash everywhere the neosporin was applied. I ended up going to the hospital because the rash was so bad and was prescribed prednisone, famotidine, and cephalexin. Everything was healing well once i started the medication about a week ago, but now it seems the wounds are infected again because they are pussing really badly. I finished taking the prednisone and famotidine and still have another day left of taking the cephalexin. I keep aquaphor on the affected ares to protect my skin but I was wondering if there was anything else I can do to get rid of the infection because it seems the medication isn't doing anything. Please help!

[Alan Rockoff, MD]

Neosporin can cause an allergic rash, and that is probably what you had.  I cannot, however, make any sense of the swollen rash you say you have now.  It is almost certainly inflamed, not infected, and perhaps you need more anti-inflammatory treatment to suppress what might be a flare of the allergic reaction, even though you've stopped using the neosporin.  In any case, you need to contact not a doctor on the internet but the doctors who have been taking care of you in person.  Please do this at once.

Thank you.

Dr. Rockoff