Kids with Hot Hands and Feet

Pseudomonas aeruginosa grows well in the warm water of hot tubs and other pools, unless the chlorine or bromide levels are high and the pH is maintained between 7.6 and 7.8, at which point these additives exert their maximal antibacterial effects. When such conditions do not prevail, outbreaks of pseudomonas folliculitis may occur, characterized by the appearance, 7 hours to 5 days later, of pruritic follicular papules, pustules, or vesicobullae. These spontaneously resolve within 5 days. In 2001, investigators reported the “pseudomonas hot foot syndrome.” Intensely painful, dusky plantar erythema and nodules of 1 cm to 2 cm developed on the weight-bearing areas of the soles in 40 children 10 to 40 hours after immersion in a contaminated pu…