There are dozens of brands and types of baby wipes nowadays, including the ones specifically made to clean baby’s hands. Having a plethora of choices is a good thing as you can compare more products to choose the best one, but it can also come off as confusing and overwhelming, especially for first-time parents. Below, you will be guided through a couple of tips on how to choose the best antibacterial hand wipes for babies.
When Did Baby Wipes Start to Be Produced?
In the old days, before baby wipes were a thing—let alone baby hand wipes—families typically used washable and reusable fabric scraps or fabric wipes. Commercial disposable wipes have only become a thing when some companies started to produce them around 1950s. Unsurprisingly, they took a big hit as many people found them to be extremely simple and practical cleaning tool. That being said, particularly branded wipes for baby weren’t really produced until about 1980s.
In recent decades, disposable baby wipes are considered essentials for parents of newborns, toddlers, and young children. Aside from being used to clean hands, they are also used for diaper duty or face wipes.
What to Consider When Choosing Baby Hand Wipes?
Here are some important considerations to take to choose the best baby wipes brand or type:
- Fragrance
Smelling nice scent around while cleaning your baby sounds great, but that’s about where the benefit of scented baby wipes stops. These wipes are typically infused with chemical fragrance that potentially causes unwanted reactions in some babies, such as allergy, skin irritation, or rashes.
In general, it is best to go with unscented products, especially if you use them as pacifier wipes. However, if you really consider pleasant scent is really necessity, for example to remove odors, then make sure you choose naturally scented ones. Natural ingredients such as lavender or chamomile extract would make a good, most likely safe choice.
- Formula
A lot of baby products, including hand wipes, are labeled with claims such as “dermatologically tested” or “hypoallergenic”. While these words may sound gimmicky, they can serve as good indicators to choose the best possible wipes for your baby.
“Dermatologically tested” is a term that refers to product that was consulted or tested by licensed dermatologists to examine any possible harmful reaction to the skin. These products are typically already tested on human skin and are proven to be safe to apply to the baby skin. Meanwhile, “hypoallergenic” pertains to products that do not trigger allergies because they don’t contain allergens.
Choosing baby wipes that are labeled with both terms above can give you further assurance that the product indeed safe to be used on your baby.
It is totally understandable that you are willing to go through detailed research for each product that the baby is going to use or consume, especially if you are a new parent or about to become one. The brief guide on how to select the best antibacterial hand wipes for babies that serves a couple of factors to consider above is meant to help you to understand further about one of the baby essential items.
