Cholinergic Urticaria - Symptoms, Causes and Treatment

Is your cholinergic urticaria making you feel like you're destroyed inside? feel like you can't get the answers that you seek? this will change everything as soon as you start reading. Here you will get concrete information about cholinergic urticaria, including the symptoms, causes and possibly what you can do to get some relief.

What Is Cholinergic Urticaria?

This form of skin hives is fairly common out of all of the different forms of chronic urticaria. It's been estimated that about 11% of chronic urticaria sufferers will have cholinergic urticaria. It's main trigger is outside heat causing an internal rise in body temperature. Emotional stress is also a major contributor, but cholinergic urticaria is often times also known as exercise induced hives, because physical activities like yard work or hitting the gym can also bring it on.

However, you should also know that heat hives, or solar urticaria can be labeled sometimes as a classification of cholinergic urticaria. Essentially, anything that has to do with elevated temperatures is what triggers a person's skin to break out into this unpleasant form of skin hives.

What shocks most hives patients isn't always the fact that they have cholinergic urticaria, but the factors that can trigger it. Blushing, taking a shower consisting of hot water, and even eating spicy food can induce this form of hives. It is still widely believed that one of the largest causes of cholinergic urticaria in hives patients is stress. The good news is that there are plenty of ways and lots of knowledge on managing stress. The bad news is that cholinergic urticaria can also cause a lot of stress for the individual who suffers with it.

Studies have revealed some interesting findings. It's believed that men are slightly more prone to this type of urticaria for some reason. It's also be revealed that the medium age for those affected by this skin issue is 22, with studies ranging from 16 - 30 years of age.

On average, 7.5 years is the long term duration that it lasts, but it has also been known to last in some patients for as long as 30 years.

What Causes Cholinergic Urticaria?

Although heat hives at the core is caused by a rising in body temperature from a physical stimulus, in actual fact it's the sweating that leads to the outbreak of wheals (raised, itchy patches of skin) on the body. These spots are typically about 2 - 3 millimeters in size, and most of the time will occur within 20 minutes of stimulus, although it can take a little longer sometimes.

Compared to other types of hives, these itchy patches of skin typically don't last as long, with the longest duration being a few hours, but more often than not, only being present for about 30 minutes.

Cholinergic is the term which means "related to acetylcholine", and acetylcholine is a chemical that originates as a neurotransmitter from the parasymphatic nervous system. When released this chemical can cause a hives reaction.

Although it's widely known that a rise in body temperature, followed by sweating, then by the secretion of acetylcholine, and then by a histamine reaction is what causes cholinergic urticaria to occur, the true root cause is not understood, and more testing and research is required at the point in time.

Symptoms Of Cholinergic Urticaria

The symptoms are pretty straight forward. Small, pruritic (itchy) wheals that range in size between 1 - 3 mm, with the outside areas becoming flared.

The wheals can appear anywhere on the body, except for the palms of the hands and soles of the feet. Understanding this description can help someone determine whether or not they have cholinergic urticaria.

There are other symptoms that are non skin related as well. Abdominal cramping along with diarrhea, headaches and even lightheadedness or fainting can occur.

Does Cholinergic Urticaria Treatment Exist?

Yes and no. There really is no believed treatment, but the antihistamine hydroxyzine seems to have a positive effect on this condition. The only set back is that it causes major drowsiness, which is hard to tolerate for most patients.

People who learn to live well alongside cholinergic urticaria tend to do so by having a game plan to stick with. They may take short, warm showers, exercise minimally throughout the day (rather than all at once), and avoid certain spicy foods in their diet.

Studies have shown that this form of hives can come on not as a shift in core body temperature or skin surface temperature, but a collection of the average body temperature.