Comments on: Cheap-looking bug-bite zapper actually works

By: Frank Boosman

Frank Boosman — Tue, 21 Aug 2012 14:24:00 +0000

I react none-too-well to mosquito bites and have been suffering from a handful the last few days, after a trip that involved some hiking. I just tried this technique last night and it worked wonders. I’m at 12 hours now and no itching, no burning, no pain, no nothing.

As the saying goes, the plural of anecdote is not data, so I don’t pretend this is scientific, but it did work for me.

By: agthorn

agthorn — Mon, 20 Aug 2012 19:22:00 +0000

Clinical study != clinical trial. The latter means it adheres to rigorous standards of design, power, blinding, control, etc. The former means “someone with an MD looked at it.”

By: p96

p96 — Mon, 20 Aug 2012 17:30:00 +0000

seconded – hot candle wax works great

By: lsamsa

lsamsa — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 22:23:00 +0000

After trying the usual store bought remedies &/or just scratching the h*ll out of our mosquito bites…I found an interesting little fix on the internet two years ago.
Boil some water…dip a teaspoon in…then lightly touch the bite with the tip of the teaspoon…only for a couple of seconds. (Hubby thought more was better once & ended up with a small burn…he learned.)
We were amazed that it actually works. The itch is gone for about 24 hours & possibly may need one more application the next day…but the bites are itch-free & heal faster, due to the lack of scratching.
So, same idea…but free!

By: cdh1971

cdh1971 — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 22:08:00 +0000

Oh, I know real AIs aren’t currently used even for context sensitive filtering, except experimentally. I was just attempting humour.

By: ken ray

ken ray — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 21:20:00 +0000

two words – candle wax

By: Nutrition Industry

Nutrition Industry — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 19:01:00 +0000

I agree about the placebo effect. Maybe you could use the same device shell but, instead of heat, it applies a really small pezioelectric shock or just vibrates.

By: prius04

prius04 — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 18:32:00 +0000

The mosquito bite is all about histamine release and I’m surprised so few people allude to it in this thread.

The mosquito bite causes histamine release. As does Poison Ivy. Histamine causes the itch. Scratching it causes relief of the itch but actually leads to MORE histamine release. Thus in a few minutes it itches even worse.

Pain however will stop the histamine release. That is why people will often scratch bites until it hurts and they bleed. Because that causes the histamine release to end. However, a healing scab often will also cause a histamine release, so when the wound that you created by scratching starts to heal, a person can restart the whole cycle.

Sounds like this device, by causing some pain but without causing a full wound, can break the histamine cycle. But there are many free ways to do that, you just don’t want to damage the area.

By: prius04

prius04 — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 18:24:00 +0000

Finally an answer that is in the ballpark. The mosquito bite causes histamine release. As does Poison Ivy. Scratching it causes relief of the itch but actually leads to MORE histamine release. This in a few minutes it itches even worse.

Pain however will stop the histamine release. That is why people will often scratch bites until it hurts and they bleed. Because that causes the histamine release to end. However, and healing scab often will also cause a histamine release, so when the wound that you created by scratching starts to heal, a person can restart the whole cycle.

Sounds like this device, by causing some pain but without causing a wound can break the histamine cycle.

By: Laura Gjovaag

Laura Gjovaag — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 17:00:00 +0000

http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cdrh/cfdocs/cfpmn/pmn_template.cfm?id=k964397

The FDA has “cleared” it, if just a check to make sure it’s not a harmful product counts as cleared.

By: DewiMorgan

DewiMorgan — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 16:55:00 +0000

When I moved from the UK (where I was used to the mosquito bites and they would disappear in minutes if they showed at all) to Austin, where my immune systems was unused to the mosquitoes, the bites could grow to the size of a fried egg, with a hard core the size of my thumbnail, and they would last about a five days. The outer, raised, and red area itches, but the hard core *burns*, as if you’ve been injected with capsaicin… but unlike capsaicin, it doesn’t fade after a few minutes. A dozen bites and you cannot sleep.

After a couple of years here, deliberately letting myself get bitten to build my immunity, the bites have shrunk to the size of my thumbtip, and the hard core just rice-grain sized, if it’s there at all. They last perhaps two days.

With West Nile becoming a problem, though, I’m more leery of being bitten now, so I imagine it will take some time for my immunity to reach the level it was in the UK.

By: Ben Hyde

Ben Hyde — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 15:37:00 +0000

My entire family has been using a related technique we picked up circa 1970. Take _near_ scalding water (most hot tap water is sufficient); and apply it for just a moment to the area that itches. It seems to work even if you do it so fast you don’t notice the heat. This works on all itching, apparently it stuns the nerves or something. It works instantly, so if nothing happens try it adjust the temperature/duration. The effect lasts a few hours. This was a life saver the time I got caught in a cloud of smoke from burning poison ivy vines. To be clear if there is _any_ risk of a burn then your doing it wrong.

By: David Pescovitz

David Pescovitz — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 15:03:00 +0000

I can’t even find the stuff ever since eBay made that new policy…
http://boingboing.net/2012/08/16/no-more-spells-hexes-or-pray.html

By: dculberson

dculberson — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 12:14:00 +0000

But it has clinical in the name!

By: GammaBlog

GammaBlog — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 10:38:00 +0000

I’m the type of person other people love to take on a trip in the woods because I attract all the mosquitoes to my tender flesh. I came up with a heat method that usually works for me. Warning: It sometimes results in burning flesh if not done just right. Take a butter knife and pass the tip briefly through a flame, and then tap it on the bite. If it is hot enough to sting the itch will go away immediately. If it is not hot enough to sting try again. Much safer, is applying an ice cube immediately after being bitten. I also keep some witch hazel in a spray bottle to apply to the itch, works well.

By: flaneurben

flaneurben — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 09:10:00 +0000

Hmm, unpublished unblinded “studies” which report patient perception of itch as the main outcome measure aren’t the most convincing evidence, here.

By: flaneurben

flaneurben — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 09:05:00 +0000

Seems to me the placebo effect could be pretty powerful here - how would we go about designing a double-blind RCT?

By: lasershark

lasershark — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 08:50:00 +0000

http://www.zen22142.zen.co.uk/Circuits/Misc/wart_zap/wart_zapper.htm

By: noah django

noah django — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 07:26:00 +0000

I was taught on Fels Naptha soap, but can’t really claim any true positive results versus any other soap. FWIW, there’s a ton of google results vis-a-vis Fels Naptha and poison ivy. Poison ivy never really got to me much, though, and once I’d caught it once in a season, it’s effects were even more diminished.

By: CH

CH — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 06:35:00 +0000

Yep… It’s an allergic reaction. Taking an antihistamine will help though.

By: ryuthrowsstuff

ryuthrowsstuff — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 06:17:00 +0000

I’m massively, massively allergic to poison ivy. I’ve more than once had 300+ cc’s of fluid drained from my fingers. I get what’s called a systemic reaction; so fever, joint ache’s and nausea go along with it. And while really hot water just tends to irritate things, very warm water always tends to relieve the pain. Doesn’t end things any quicker but kills the itch and soothes the aches.

Chiggers and bug bites though tend to be fine with the hotter water. I remember my grandmother using boiling water mixed with vinegar to drive chiggers out of my skin.

By: Incipient Madness

Incipient Madness — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 04:59:00 +0000

Mosquitoes don’t have venom. The swelling and itching of the bite are your immune response to the anticoagulent enzymes the mosquito injects to keep itself from being killed by your clotting response.

West Nile is no joke. I’m pretty sure I had it a few years ago. Fever, chills, loss of appetite, vision problems. Was about to go to the doctor, but symptoms faded after three days. I know a dude who went into a coma and had to learn how to walk again after West Nile. And we’re having an outbreak right now as SE Texas has had it’s usual rainy June and July after last year’s drought.

Scary thing is that its now believed that people who seem to have fought off the virus may have long term health problems from West Nile.

By: pjcamp

pjcamp — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 04:23:00 +0000

Yeah, I think being burnt would make me forget about mosquito bites too.

By: Scooter Jackson

Scooter Jackson — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 04:09:00 +0000

T-minus 10 till the DIY vaporizer plans pop up.

By: Crashproof

Crashproof — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 03:43:00 +0000

Bayesian filters could probably do it; it wouldn’t take real AI.

By: Boris Bartlog

Boris Bartlog — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 03:38:00 +0000

Detergent isn’t going to destroy the urushiol any more than soap will… it might be slightly better at solvating it but that too is ‘spreading it around’. If you realize you have poison ivy exposure before actual symptoms develop I would recommend bleach (but not for too long, it’s caustic); the hypochlorite does actually destroy the urushiol by attacking the unsaturated double bonds.
Very hot water helps the symptoms of poison ivy, so I can readily believe that this device works. But that is far different from believing their claimed mechanism.

By: Funk Daddy

Funk Daddy — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 03:30:00 +0000

I doubt they would heed such a warning. The website claims that it’s FDA “cleared” but the FDA does not clear products at all and the term is indicated by the FDA as a warning sign of a false claim to fool the consumer into believing that it is FDA tested, which it probably is not.

Another surefire mosquito bite temporary fix, popping it with a rubber band really well. FDA CLEARED!

By: Anahata

Anahata — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 03:28:00 +0000

Rubbing a wet aspirin on bug bites permanently stops the itching within seconds for me.

By: Mitch_M

Mitch_M — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 03:18:00 +0000

I laughed at getting attacked by yellow jackets and the stinging sensation was not so bad but then they itched like hell for a week. I might consider trying that.

By: Funk Daddy

Funk Daddy — Sat, 18 Aug 2012 03:17:00 +0000

Soap & water just spreads it around, gotta be an actual detergent as he says as that oil is pernicious to say the least. Most soaps and body washes are soap and not detergent.

An yor right, this device would do squat all about poison ivy