Sweating Too Much In Summer? Follow These Expert's Tips And Avoid Embarrassment

Sweating and bad odour might be common, especially in summer, it can also cause embarrassment and social anxiety. A dermatologist shares how you can manage your sweating woes.

People tend to lot sweat more in summer (Image by Freepik)

The sweat glands in your body are responsible for sweating and bad odour. Then there is the apocrine gland which is a second type of sweat gland and is located in body areas where you have hair, such as your armpits and groin. While sweating is natural and even healthy, in summer, you might sweat excessively. This can make people socially awkward and anxious. Dr Jyoti Gupta, a Delhi-based dermatologist, shares a few tips to control excessive sweating.

How To Prevent Excessive Sweating

1. Change Your Diet: Overtly smelly foods like garlic, onions, alcohol, spicy foods, caffeinated drinks, etc can be limited. If you find some particular food is making you smell worse, eliminate it from your diet or have it in limited quantity.

2. Do Not Over-Exercise: While staying sedentary is bad, overexercising, especially in summer, can cause you to sweat profusely and in turn, lead to bad odour. To reduce sweat, try to exercise in cooler environments like indoors. Those who sweat too much, opt for exercises like weight lifting or yoga, rather than cardio in summer. 

3. Check On Your Medicines: Some medications can lead to excessive sweating. Some of the drugs include prednisone (Rayos)and escitalopram (Lexapro). OTC pain relievers, like ibuprofen (Motrin, Advil) can also lead to too much sweat. If excessive sweating is too much of an issue, discuss with your healthcare provider about your options. Doctors can change your medicines, or change dosage. However, don't change your medications without consulting a doctor. 

4. Monitor Health Conditions: If you have issues like thyroid, or diabetes, or are suffering from fever due to undetermined causes, you can sweat excessively. Visit a healthcare professional and get yourself thoroughly checked.

5. Make Lifestyle Adjustments: Until and unless it's an abnormal amount of sweat, making lifestyle changes can solve your problem to a large extent. In summer, especially if you are prone to sweating, stick to lightweight cotton clothes or those made of breathable fabric. Wash your face and body when too sweaty and change into a fresh pair of clothes. This also reduces the risk of bacterial or yeast infections. Stay hydrated, and drink plenty of fluids to compensate for the electrolytes lost through sweating.

6. Shave Your Armpits: Sweat evaporates quickly and doesn’t have as much time to interact with bacteria when your armpits are shaved. 

Dermatological Procedures To Control Sweating

If you are sweating excessively, dermatological procedures might be suggested by doctors. "Neuromodulators, popularly known as Botox relaxes a chemical in the body that activates the sweat glands. So using underarm Botox injections can reduce sweating by 82–87%. The effects can typically last between 4 and months and after that, the process has to be repeated," says Dr Jyoti Gupta. She adds that treatments for excessive sweating and body odour are largely dependent on the underlying cause, which can vary in every individual. Therefore, Dr Gupta says, it is important to know the underlying cause and talk about it freely with your dermatologist and seek the right treatment at the earliest.