JustCare

Tag: Skin care

  • Skin care products carry big risks

    Skin care products carry big risks

    A 2017 research letter in JAMA Internal Medicine speaks to the big risks of cosmetics and other skin care products, which do not require Food and Drug Administration (FDA) pre-market approval; manufacturers are not even required to let the FDA know about reported harms. Risks include everything from non-serious injury to serious injury, disability, congenital defect or death. You can learn more about products from the FDA’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition’s Adverse Event Reporting System (CFSAN).

    There are risks associated with lipsticks, lip ointments and mascaras. One product, WEN, by Chaz Dean Cleansing Conditioners appears to cause hair to fall out as well as scalp irritation. Although the manufacturer has received 21,000 complaints about the product, it is still on the market.

    If you’d like to avoid buying products that contain dangerous chemicals, visit the Environmental Working Group’s Skin Deep site, which rates almost 70,000 skin care products based on their chemical makeup.

    The three categories of products most reported on CFSAN were hair care, skin care and tattoos. Products with the most serious health outcomes were baby products, personal cleanliness products and hair coloring products.

    The FDA needs to oversee cosmetics and personal care products, especially because these products do not need to be approved before being sold. Requiring manufacturers of personal care products to report adverse events is critical. The CFSAN likely only captures a small portion of harms.

    California Senator Diane Feinstein has a bill in Congress, the Personal Care Products Safety Act (S.726), which would give the FDA the ability to recall unsafe cosmetics and personal care products and would also require the manufacturers to report adverse events.

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    This post was first published on July 4, 2017 and has been updated.

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  • How to keep aging skin as healthy as possible

    How to keep aging skin as healthy as possible

    Your skin–the largest organ in your body–serves many critical purposes, so skin care is important. Skin care is particularly important as you age, because, inevitably, your skin will thin. Here’s a primer on how your skin functions and how to keep aging skin as healthy as possible.

    Your skin protects all the organs in your body. It keeps harmful microbes from getting into your body, preventing infections. Your skin’s nerve receptors enable you to feel when anything touches you, including heat, cold, pain and pressure. And, your skin keeps your body temperature even.

    Your skin also controls fluid and electrolyte balance in your body. Electrolytes are the minerals in your blood and other body fluids. Sodium, potassium, magnesium and calcium are all electrolytes. They carry an electric charge and play a large role in how your body is working, including how much water is in your body, how much acidity is in your blood, and how well your muscles work.

    And, your skin makes vitamin D for your body through exposure to the sun.

    No matter your age, to care for your skin, you should replace electrolytes that you lose when you sweat by drinking fluids with electrolytes. Water does not contain electrolytes. You also should protect your skin from too much exposure to the sun, covering it or using sunscreens. And, you should avoid smoking. Cigarette smoking thins your skin and causes it to wrinkle.

    Your skin thins as you age and becomes less oily and drier. Your skin loses fat and becomes less elastic. Cuts and scratches may heal less quickly. Your skin may also wrinkle and spot. In short, the process by which your skin naturally rejuvenates slows down significantly. Genetics, over which you have no control, plays a role in the pace at which these changes occur.

    To help keep your skin from being dry, the NIH recommends that you use lotions and ointments to moisturize your skin daily. But, wrinkle creams are not likely to reduce wrinkles. The Mayo Clinic suggests that a few ingredients in some creams could improve the way your wrinkles appear, including retinol, an antioxidant, which keep free radicals in your skin from breaking down skin cells. It also suggests that creams with alpha, beta and poly hydroxy acids, can remove old dead skin at the surface and cause new smoother skin to grow.

    Your skin also benefits if you take fewer baths and showers because water dries your skin. And, if you use a humidifier, it will make the air in your room wetter, which helps your skin.

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