A DOC Band Saga

Over seven weeks ago CJ first received his DOC Band to help reshape his head. The first few weeks things seemed to be going really well, but then about 4 weeks into wearing it I noticed he was developing a rash on the back of his head. I called and they said it's a heat rash just put some hydrocortisone cream on it and it should be fine in a day. Well, no improvement one day later so I called back and they said okay take the band off let it heal and then put the band back on. So I did, but after it healed and the band went back on the rash came back. He has seemed to completely stump the employees at Cranial Tech with this rash. For weeks now we've been going in every week to try to control this. It has just been expanding more and more around his head.

So this last time when we drove down there I was a little better prepared with a second opinion. His doctor had seen the rash now and was sure that despite what Cranial Tech believed he is in deed allergic to the material in the band and is developing eczema. She had suggested some sort of barrier, which I have been told time and time again is not possible to do. So when I told them this week about what the doctor said I was told again that she doesn't believe that to be the problem because it's not all over his head and she has never seen this in the eight years of doing this. But if that's what his doctor thinks it is she's not saying that she's wrong, but she's never seen it and she still believes it's a heat rash. Now suddenly though she is able to line the helmet with something. So in the spots he's getting the rash she has put this felt feeling material in there. She told me to wait until his head heals from this current rash and then put it back on so we can be sure if this helps or not. She doesn't sound too optimistic that it will help though. I have had the helmet off since Thursday now. He still has a bit of rash on his head, but it's mostly healed so I'll probably put it back on today. We go back again on Wednesday to see if this has helped.

She did compare his head to the mold of the pretreatment shape and there is improvement. So it is working. We just need to get it to stay on his head long enough to be effective. We are halfway through what they told us would be the treatment time. I'm still optimistic that we'll have it off for his birthday.