
February 18, 2003
Other
Question from Chicago, Illinois, USA:
I have had type 1 diabetes for a little over a year, and I have a unusual body odor that occurs when I sweat. It is all over my body. It smells like a boiled egg and is worse the harder I sweat. Do have any suggestions as to what this could possibly be?
Answer:
Body odor can be caused by excessive sweating or secretions from the skin. The residual sweat and secretions may contain bacteria that make the matter worse. I am not sure that the diabetes is causing this. Rather, I would concentrate on using a good antiperspirant to prevent the sweating and a good soap to kill the bacteria on the skin (like Dial soap). If problems persist, you may want to discuss this with your physician to see if you have evidence of a hormone excess syndrome that might drive the production of excess sweat. Some experimentation will be necessary to see if you can prevent this.
JTL