Video:The Cause of Scabies: a Tiny Mite

Transcript:The Cause of Scabies: a Tiny Mite

Hi, this is Dr. Debra Jaliman, a board certified dermatologist in New York City, talking about scabies for About.com.

The Scabies Mite

Scabies is an eight-legged mite that is microscopic. You’ll never see it, but it burrows under your skin, and it’s very itchy. You get these little burrows, where you get little red bumps which can occur between the finger spaces, on the wrists, between the elbows and on the ankles.

Symptoms of Scabies

It can occur in the genital area, and it’s extremely itchy, very contagious, and easy to treat if you make the right diagnosis. The mite itself, the female mite, lays eggs in the skin at twenty-one days.

So, what happens is the person, the itching that you feel, is from the allergic reaction to both the female mite burrowing under your skin as well as the eggs under the skin.

Properly Treat Scabies

So, many times people are treated incorrectly because they’re only treated for the female mite, and then twenty-one days later when the female mite lays eggs, there’s another round of itching.

So, make certain if you get treatment, you get treatment first and then twenty-one days later. You need to treat both the skin as well as all of your clothes and your bedding. And, make sure that any intimate contacts are treated as well. If you need any more information about scabies, please go to About.com