Question:
A cyberfriend's 13 year old is experiencing underarm odor and her teachers are not very understanding. The young lady's doctor said that her diabetes has caused it but that she'll outgrow the odor problem. Is this one of the side-problems of the diabetes?
Answer:
Under arm odor tends naturally to be more noticeable with the teen years, but is not specifically a feature of Type 1 Diabetes. If it doesn't respond to routine measures of personal hygiene and underarm deodorants, it might be worth considering something very rare like trimethylaminuria. Rather than go to the lengths of diagnosing this, it might be worth finding out if by avoiding fish and eggs for a few days the problem disappears. (And I assume that no one is confusing this with
acetone
in this girl's breath.)
DO'B
Original posting 11 Feb 98