Natalie (Oak Lawn, Il, Usa) on 03/27/2010:

In February of this year under the advice of her pediatrician, I brought her to a dermatologist who put the extract of a beetle on the bumps- they blistered up and bled and it was not a good experience, one I would not repeat. The blistering also left a scar on her skin. The molluscum did go away in the particular bump that was treated but new bumps came up. I noticed after this that the one bump that she had gotten on her knee began to spread to a few more. She started getting a lot more molluscum bumps- it began to spread like wildfire overnight. I felt I had to intervene and purchased the natural molloscum healing product I saw online- which is basically tea tree oil with some other ingredients. After only one day of application, my daughter woke up the next day with even more bumps all over her knees, feet, and even her fingers- thumb and forefinger- had bumps although I had read that the molluscum does not break through the soles of the feet or the hands. It had also spread to her elbows and I was afraid that it was going to spread to her face since a few red spots had appeared on her cheeks.

I stopped this tea tree oil based treatment, which was very expensive for such a tiny bottle, and researched scholarly articles and came across a study about cimetidine. Apparently children in a clinical study were administered the cimetidine for 6 weeks, in 3-4 doses of 200 mgs per 15 kgs of weight. I bought the drug over the counter, cut it in half, crushed it and gave it to her with a 1/2 teaspoon of sugar to mask the taste. I went to her pediatrician with the information and she gave me a perscription which was at the low end of the dose from the clinical trial- equivalent to 400 mgs per day of cimetidine, and she weighs 35 lbs. I am so happy and thankful to report that my daughter is completely cured of the molluscum!! She is also very happy and looks for the "spots" as she called them but they are all gone!! We used to go through putting antibiotic ointments on them and covering them with bandaids all the time, she knows the rituals by heart. I tried everything, the vinegar in the bath, salt in the bath, the tea tree oil made it worse, but the cimetidine cured her.

With the help of the cimetidine, her immune system recognized that there was a virus she needed to fight- it has immunomodulatory effects that include blocking suppressor T cells and facilitating cell-mediated immunity, according to the study. I only had her on the medication for 2 weeks, but I saw immense and immediate results in only a few days. The bumps became instantly flat, the white centers went away and the bumps began to get dry skin patches on them. I hope the information that I have shared here can help someone with this awful virus.