palms of hands peeling after working with varnish

[anitabutlerjw]

I have noticed that my palms on the hands started peeling in round circles that spread over the entire palm after I was working with varnish. I wore plastic gloves to protect my palms from peeling yesterday and this morning I noticed more peeling spreading down to my wrists. There is dull pain throbbing on the palms

[Bhupinder Kaur, MD]

Hello,
From the symptoms it looks like contact dermatitis or an allergic reaction to the varnish. You can apply some calamine lotion at the rash as it will help in soothing the skin. You can take some OTC oral antihistamine medications like Benadryl or Claritin and see if it helps.

For mild-moderate symptoms a weak steroid may be used and also use good quality moisturizers to prevent moisture loss from the skin. If still the symptoms do not improve then please get a clinical examination done by a dermatologist as oral steroids may be needed. It is very difficult to precisely confirm a diagnosis without examination and investigations and the answer is based on the medical information provided. For exact diagnosis, you are requested to consult your dermatologist. I sincerely hope that helps. Take care and please do keep me posted on how you are doing.

[MeJane1234]

First, I would check out a latex allergy. Second, if you were using latex gloves, they may not be compatable with varnish.  Some chemicals will penetrate gloves and therefore you may have chemical burns or irritation.  I used to work with hexane and it would eat right through latex - nitrile gloves were the way to go.  Good luck.