Hives??

*waves*  A question if I may... 

I am almost a month post op, had surgery on the 26th of August. For about the last two weeks in the evenings I break out in horrible hives, itching like crazy and turning red. Arms, neck and chest. That is about as far as it goes. I am not using anything different soap wise, or lotion wise. Taking my usual medication, have been off the pain pills since a few days after discharge. I occasionally got hives in the past, very rare however. 

Has anyone experienced this flare up of hives after surgery? Any idea what it can be?? I take one benadryl pill when it gets bad but I really do hate this and taking medication every night for it. 

Thanks so much!!

I had hives on and off...finally a trip to allergist - to find out i am alkergic to soy, dairy (milk, cheese, whey, yogurt..- milk proteins). 

Maybe a time to allergist..

My doc said I could use a Benadryl cream. My freaking stomach itched so badly for weeks. It wasn't the healing incision site it was everything around it. I have an allergy to latex so none was used in the hospital. I still don't know what set it off. My allergist told me years ago that there are no tests for all the man-made things I may be allergic to. I would have to do a trial and error thing. It took YEARS for me to determine I am allergic to SPF. He suggested I put a dab of any new cream, lotion, soap on the inside of my arm and cover it. If it affects this sensitive area then it will most likely affect the rest of me. He also said that certain times of year things that don't bother me may begin to cause a reaction. For instance, new lotion may be OK in the winter, but not in the spring where the pollen count goes up and my body is already under attack.

Good luck to you. Hopefully as we move closer to winter the reactions will lessen!

oh yeah - both Prevacid and Zantac caused me to break out in hives post-op.   Doctor was stunned because no one he's ever had experienced that.  I'm pretty sensitive to medications.  

Also, even though you may not be taking any "new" medications our systems can get overloaded with toxins and those toxins will leach out onto the skin and cause hives or contact dermatitis.  You may want to try stopping everything (if you can) and then slowly introduce other things back.  Also, food allergies can occur post-op that you didn't necessarily have pre-op.  

Hope you get it figured out!  Hives are miserable :-( 

Thanks everyone for your replies!! I made an appt with my PCP this Friday, for other reasons but am going to mention the hives. Will see what he says and go from there. I wonder how long it would take to stop the meds and then add them back in slowly to see if it is a med? 

I too hope I find a cause! They are miserable as you all know!  Thanks again!

I feel for you! I have had 2 different extended bouts of hives in the past along with some short bouts in there. One lasting 9 months and one lasting about 8 months. I'm 15 days post-op now and I broke out again last Saturday....I'm still broken out. My allergist has done all kinds of tests but we still don't know what I'm allergic to. They have always just gone away. Oddly, the last 2 times I had them, they went away right after I got pregnant with my kids. For this round, I'm NOT getting pregnant to get rid of them! I hope they just go away eventually!

So, I totally feel for you! I hope you figure out what's causing yours!

I had something like this. I was on the Lovenox (blood thinner) injections for a few weeks and had terrible itching around the injection sites. I've been off those meds for 3 weeks, but the skin is still recovering. But then I also had this weird rash that would show up on my back and sides every night. It was after I'd quit the Lovenox and the other meds, so I have no idea what caused it. It did seem like it improved after I cut back on dairy (I'm vegetarian, so right after surgery, I was eating a lot of yogurt to get protein in), even though I've never had a dairy allergy in the past. I took children's chewable Benadryl every night for a while until it calmed down. Aveeno (either the oatmeal bath soak in shallow enough water so incisions aren't submerged or the shower gel) also seemed to help. I never really figured out the cause, but I'm almost 6 weeks out and it's pretty much gone. Good luck!