Scar Cream - Mederma

This is a very expensive thing that doesnt do much, because scars fade with time anyways, Mederma is a skin irritant and thats how it claims to work, it aggrivates the skin and therefore it peels and scars appear normal or faded, when in truth they fade over time on their own. the best thing to do is keep the skin covered with sun block as this also makes scars appear worse. my advice is dont bother with this expensive "snake oil" (my sis in law used it on a very scarred area and all it did was make her skin sore!) when she discussed it with the dr he said pretty much what I said above. I hope this helps!

A.

I used the Mederma for kids on my daughter's face when she was about 2 and had a heavy door opened in her face. I was worried her cheek, chin, and eye would scar but we used it as directed for a month and she is scar free. Since it worked for her I had strated to put it on an old burn scar on my arm and it did fade the red in the scar after about 3 weeks of consistent use but the skin is still wrinkly.

I have always used liquid vitamin E oil to take away the redness in scars. It works really well to fade them too. You can buy it at a health food store and it isn't very expensive. I have never tried Mederma.

My plastic surgeon recommended it several times a day. I does absorb better than vitamin e oil so it doesn't get on teh clothes so much, BUT

my surgeon recommended only Vitamin E oil several times a day.

Then, my friend's knee surgeon's physical therapist used Vitamin E oil plus massage to help break up the scar band forming underneath the skin. Even vibrator massage. His scars are indeed flat and skin colored now. Also, he emphasized that any scar that could be tanned by the sun should be heavily protected with sunscreen to keep it from tanning as it might stay tan colored forever.

Maderma is expensive. Vitamin E oil isn't. I don't know if Vitamin E oil is for long term scars or not. Maderma says it can be. Whatever you do, the most important thing may be the number of times you use it per day and heavy massage.

I also can't help but wonder if taking Vitamin E supplements would help. You might want to look that up on the internet.

My son was bite by a dog on his face. The plastic surgeon had us use Merderma 2 times a day, and his scar is barley visable now (a year later).
I have tried it on my old scars (I scar easily) and it didn't really do much, but that is just for me.

We're in the the process of trying it on our pediatrician's recommendation for a scar from stitches and one from a fall (which sound more in line with what you're talking about than plastic surgery). But it says to do it for many weeks, and we just started, so I can't actually give you an opinion.

Hi, S. -
I've never tried it on my kids, especially not on old scrapes or cuts. However, I recently had a large-scale plastic surgery, resulting in long incisions. According to my plastic surgeon, Mederma does nothing, and it's really expensive. Again, I don't know about old scars, but when my kids hurt themselves, (after antibiotic ointment, of couse) I simply use Aquaphore. Seems to prevent some scarring.
Good luck.

I have tried Mederma. It works real well for a cut, that happens more then a year ago. I also have a very old scar, and in this case it did not help.

Hi S.,
I am currently using Mederma on my 3 yr. old who has a 1 yr. old scar on his face from a bad cut (18 stitches). It has been a few weeks and all I have noticed is that it got paler in color so it's not as obvious, but that's about it. Always using sunscreen is most important so that the scar doesn't darken.