Brand name medicines appear in green; generic medicines appear in red.

What you put on your skin can end up in your body

Medicines that come in creams, ointments, gels, sprays, and patches will enter your body through the skin and can cause a bad side effect if you use too much of the medicine. This can happen even if the medicine is only intended to treat a skin condition or numb the skin before a procedure. Several years ago, two young college students in different states died after they applied a numbing gel to their legs to prepare for a laser hair removal procedure. The gel contained high doses of two numbing medicines, lidocaine and tetracaine. The gel was intended to help ease any pain associated with the procedure. One woman was given the gel by staff at the spa where she was planning to have the procedure, and the other woman picked up the gel from the pharmacy. Employees at the hair removal spas told the women to apply the gel to their legs before the procedure and to cover their legs in plastic wrap. Both women had a fatal reaction to the gel because too much medicine entered their body through the skin. One woman had a seizure in her car on the way to her appointment. She lapsed into a coma and died the next week. The other woman had a seizure and was on a ventilator (breathing machine) for 2 years before she died. The deadly reaction was caused by:

• High doses of the numbing medicines in the gel
• Applying the gel to very large areas of skin (from groin to ankle)
• Too much medicine entering the body because the tight plastic wrap had heated the skin and allowed more medicine than usual to absorb.