Treatment includes keeping the damaged skin warm and dry, and applying a protective ointment. If the wet and cold are isolated in boots, another non-freezing winter worry, immersion foot, might develop. Owners of these feet complain of numbness, tingling pain, and itching. The feet look white or mottled in disgusting shades of blue, gray, and burgundy. On rewarming the pain does much more than tingle, and swelling and redness occur.
Severe cases crack the skin and bacterial invasion is imminent.
Avoid aggressive rewarming. All cases need to be kept warm and dry. Walking may become difficult. Painkillers often help. As the icy tendrils of winter swirled around his house in 1862, Maurice Raynaud took pen in frigid hand to first scratch out the description that would bear his name.