How To Prevent Jewelry Allergy

If your favorite bracelet turns your wrist green and your best earrings give you skin eruptions, have no fear. Jewelry allergy is one of the most common allergies women face. You are likely to develop contact dermatitis when your skin comes in contact with some types of jewelry. This dermatitis is a result of an allergic reaction to the nickel found in many types of jewelry. Nickel allergies are prevalent and can occur at any age. Here are some tips on how to prevent jewelry allergy.

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Take the following precautions and wear your favorite jewelry anytime:

Stick To The Good Stuff

You can insist that all your jewelry be either sterling silver or at least 14-karat gold. That’s the most effective remedy.

Try Stainless Steel

Try wearing stainless steel or plastic backs on your earrings, and purchase earrings with stainless steel posts. Although stainless steel contains nickel, it’s bound so tightly that it doesn’t leach out.

Try Clear Nail Polish

You can paint your jewelry with clear nail polish so that the skin is never in contact with the offending metal.

Protect Your Skin

Consider electroplating sentimental or perfect pieces of jewelry. Take your ring, etc. to a jeweler and see if a new layer of good metal can be applied to the contact surface. This prevents the leaching of the nickel particles onto your skin, at least for a while.

Wear It Part Time

Take your jewelry off when you don’t absolutely need to be wearing it. Diminished contact with the skin decreases the amount of allergen you are exposed to.

Pretreat Your Skin

Pretreat the skin with prescription cortisone cream, then treat the skin again three to six hours later. That will build up resistance so that the jewelry can be worn for a few hours.

Stay Dry

Keep your skin dry where your skin touches the metal. Placing your hands into a sink full of water allows metal ions to be better absorbed into the skin.

Moisturize

Wear a good layer of protective moisturizing cream. The better the barrier between you and the metal, the less likely the reaction will be bothersome.

Avoid Wearing Fitted Jewelry

Do not wear tight earrings, rings, or chains, and leave a little space so that air passes through it.

Home Remedy

Apply a paste made of 3 tablespoons of baking soda with 1 tablespoon of water to relieve symptoms of the allergy.

7 thoughts on “How To Prevent Jewelry Allergy”

  1. Hi there. Just wanted to offer advice to other people out there who have nickel allergies. Instead of constantly worrying about sweating, buying hypo-allergenic jewelry and putting barrier creams on, you can create a barrier on the jewelry itself. I’ve heard that a lot of people use the old clear nail polish technique. This is so unfortunate, as I’m sure it ruins the jewelry. Kind of a shame, esp if you’re using it on wedding rings or family heirlooms. Anyway there’s a product out there now called Super Surface Eco and it was developed in Japan. It was now recently made available on the internet and you can purchase it using PayPal and have it shipped to North America. The price is more than you’d pay for a product in North America but the components in the product is what makes the difference. It contains quartz, not cheap resins, like a lot of those $5.00 products out there on the internet. It will last much much longer and you won’t have to worry about ruining your nice jewelry. Here’s the website for any of those interested:

    http://glassskin.net/english/about.html

    Hope it works for you too!

  2. Buyer beware! I have tried to look into this Super Surface Eco stuff and have noticed that not only can I not find any information on it, but have run into this EXACT quote by Lisa Hansen on different sites and forums under different names. Seems like someone is copy and pasting the message to advertise, not to give testimonial. Not saying it does/doesn’t work, just seems a little fishy. So, be careful before spending all that money.

    1. Hi Hoshiko. Lisa here. Two years ago, a Japanese acquaintance who was retailing the product gave me a bottle as a gift. I’m quite allergic to various metals, especially earrings. It was the only thing that worked for me. Indeed I was helping him to get the word out in English, to areas outside of Japan. Forums seemed like a good bet, since that’s where I usually search for information and reviews. However I’m not sure if the product is available outside of Japan anymore, as there is no longer any web presence in English.

      1. Jennifer Shipley

        I love this product. I use it for the items in my shop. If you search super surface eco on products on google, I come up so you can see I use it and I don’t sell it. I’m actually looking for where to buy it now. I’m still on my first bottle; it lasts forever, but I recommended it to a friend and am trying to find a place to direct her to where she can buy it. I use it to prevent corrosion and scratches on my silver soldered pendants; I use it on copper items that I have patinated and polished in order to preserve the colors, and I use it on keys and snaps and zippers and other items that I touch frequently because I’m highly allergic to nickel. The coating is durable, long lasting and it does not chip or dull the finish.

  3. I bought it and just coated 8 pieces of my jewelry with it. I can’t tell you yet if it works or not… I want to make sure totally dry etc plus will probably wait until we get back from a trip to wear any of them. (I don’t want to chance getting hives or a rash before my big vacation)
    So far it looks pretty good though, I was worried might make my chains stick or not flow/clasp as smoothly. But if anything my jewelry looks shinier and prettier. I had e-mailed them with some questions prior to spending that whopping $60+ (yah, pretty pricey, but if it really works I’m totally fine with that). It’s a really small bottle but I was able to apply to: 1 “Skagen” watchband (thick), 1 20″ thick rope chain, 1 22″ serpentine chain, two Krementz rose/detailed bracelets, 2 antique cuff bracelets, and a multi-rope chain (I don’t think I got all of the multi-rope but most of it)
    I will try to remember to come back here and leave a follow-up in a couple of weeks time.

    I also do agree that the “Lisa” comment was left in a lot of places. That doesn’t bother me since it’s a new Japanese product they are probably just trying to get the word out. So far I am liking what I see but will try to remember to come back later on.

  4. OK I am back to finish my review. The Super Surface Eco stuff, worked well on my non-bendable jewelry (rings, cuff bracelets, etc). In other words, items without links. However I sadly managed to ruin 2 necklaces, the reason is that once this stuff thoroughly dried it no longer allows my necklaces to hang right or “flow”… instead of draping nicely as they should. The liquid is clear but got in-between the links of my chain items and now they are very stiff. And so if you buy it, make sure to only use it on rings, cuff or bangle bracelets etc that don’t need to bend and move. I haven’t had any allergy issues on these items since coating so on that note, am very pleased. I just wish I hadn’t ruined two of my neck chains with this whole experiment.

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