5 Mosquito Bite Relief Tips: Stop the Itch

When a mosquito latches on to suck your blood, it leaves behind a bit of saliva that contains proteins your body registers as unwanted intruders. Your immune system releases histamines, compounds that trigger itchiness, inflammation, and swelling. Naturally, once you get bit by mosquitos, you'll want to know how to make the bites stop itching.

You could try different treatments and home remedies to help relieve your itch, like rubbing alcohol and lemon balm creams. Other remedies may not be as helpful, like oatmeal baths or vinegar. Read on to learn which treatments work and how to keep the insects away to prevent more bites.

1. Ice the Itch Away

You can use an ice pack to relieve itching. Cooling the skin can calm itchiness by interacting with TRPM8, an ion channel related to nerve endings in the skin. The coolness of an ice pack or cold compress can activate TRPM8 to stop itchiness from happening.

2. Lather on Anti-Itch Creams

Another option is to apply topical options, like an over-the-counter calamine lotion or hydrocortisone cream, according to the label instructions. Products that contain local anesthetic ingredients like lidocaine or benzocaine can be beneficial by providing a numbing effect.

However, not all anti-itch creams are appropriate for everyone to use. Talk to a healthcare provider before using hydrocortisone products on young children, as they could cause side effects such as delayed growth and weight gain.

3. Take Antihistamines

For speedy relief from lots of must-scratch bites, try a non-drowsy, over-the-counter antihistamine like Zyrtec (cetirizine), Allegra (fexofenadine), or Claritin (loratadine). Antihistamines keep histamine from binding to histamine receptors. This process helps decrease itchiness and swelling.

4. Try Lemon Balm Cream

For a time-honored herbal remedy, try applying a cream that contains lemon balm essential oils to bites. Lemon balm essential oils have anti-inflammatory effects, may help with healing, and could decrease infection risk. However, talk to a healthcare provider to make sure it's safe and determine the proper dosage to use if you're pregnant, breastfeeding, or treating a child.

5. Apply An After-Bite Gel

These types of gels provide relief from bug bites and poison ivy, oak, and sumac. After-bite gels are designed to help calm skin irritation and itchiness.

Which Mosquito Bite Treatments Should You Skip?

Despite their suggested benefits, you shouldn't use certain remedies when it comes to easing itchy mosquito bites. Research for their use in treating mosquito bites is limited or unavailable. The remedies include:

• Aloe vera
  
• Basil
• Garlic
• Honey
• Lemon or lime juice
• Oatmeal baths
• Toothpaste
• Vinegar

While some home remedies for mosquito bites such as honey, oatmeal, and aloe vera could help dial down inflamed skin, they're not nearly as effective in the anti-itch department compared to other mosquito bite treatments, Susan Bard, MD, a board-certified dermatologist based in New York City, told Health.

How Can You Prevent Mosquito Bites?

Here are a few ways to prevent or reduce your risk of being bitten by mosquitoes:

• Cover up: Wear long sleeves and pants or treat your threads with permethrin spray specially formulated for clothing, which irritates biters on contact. Permethrin spray should not be used directly on the skin.
  
• Hang mosquito nets: Surround outdoor hangout areas, strollers, and baby carriers with mosquito netting to keep bugs out, and patch up holes in screens on doors and windows.
• Pour out standing water: Regularly turn over water collectors (hot spots for mosquito eggs) in your yards—such as bird baths, buckets, trash cans, and flower pots. The CDC also recommended that you make sure to cover water storage containers (e.g., buckets and cisterns) so that mosquitoes cannot get into them.
• Spray away: Use an insect repellent approved by the Environmental Protection Agency such as DEET, picaridin, IR3535, oil of lemon eucalyptus (OLE), para-menthane-diol (PMD), or 2-undecanone. For children, avoid OLE or PMD products, opt for DEET 30% or lower, and avoid using repellent on infants younger than 2 months old.

A Quick Review

Mosquito bites are annoying and itchy. While there are some ways to avoid them—using insect repellent, mosquito nets, and more—those pesky bites are sometimes inevitable. To calm the itchiness, try applying lemon balm cream, cold compresses, and anti-itch creams. If you have what appears to be an allergic reaction to a bite, seek out emergency medical care.