Did you know that more than 1 million cases of skin cancer are diagnosed in the United States every year? One in every 3 cancers diagnosed worldwide is a skin cancer. In 1944, Coppertone sunscreen became the first mass marketed sunscreen. Fast forward to today, about a billion dollars worth of sunscreen are sold each year in the United States.
These days, dermatologists and uninformed health fanatics give the sun a bad reputation. We see shows featuring doctors that lecture audiences on skin cancer and the necessity – real or imagined – of sun screen. We read magazine articles regarding the subject of the public’s growing concern with skin cancer. We watch commercials that promote sun screens to protect us from the UV rays that reached out to us for thousands of years.
A new kind of threat lurks the shelves lined with vitamins and supplements at pharmacies, grocery stores, and health stores. Many people, maybe even yourself among them, ingest or apply these indistinctive products to their skin, hoping for trustworthy improvement of health and appearance as a result. These mystery supplements often facade as vitamins, providing a mask of fake health as marketed by mainstream medical practices and pharmaceutics. Of course, we do believe it is highly important to take your vitamins. But there are some facts you may want to know before making a selection.
Liver spots, sun spots, age spots… We call them by different names, but they all imply the same thing – an overage of melanin in one area. No matter what your age, you may develop small, dark areas of skin that appear throughout the years.
As we age, we start to notice that our skin does not fit the way it used to. We earn jowls, bags under our eyes, and increased sagging around our mouths. These developments can make us more aware of our age, and in turn, we start to look for some solutions.
The sun and its light surrounds us nearly every minute of every day. Even on cloudy days, its rays still reach the surface of the planet, keeping the life on earth warm and alive. All living things need the sun to survive, as it produces plants with their needed energy. In turn, plants provide us with food and a number of other substances that we can easily make use of. It feels good to bask in its light, and soak it up onto our complexion. But how does the sun affect our skin? And what does it make or break the average anti-aging routine?
The sun can cause up to ninety percent of aesthetics resulting from the dreaded aging process – such as wrinkles, fine lines, sagging, or age spots. It is one of many environmental elements that we receive consistent, daily exposure to, whether we walk from our car to a building a few times a day or take a walk in the sun for hours. Dermatologists have harped and crowed about the need for sunscreen to prevent some of the damage from occurring, and to protect the skin from developing skin cancer and other forms of sun damage that will show up years down the road. With all the environmental factors involved in the aging process, it is understandable that so many people place such high importance on minimizing the damage.
Light surrounds us throughout every part of every day. Even when night falls, and we prepare to bed down and hit the hay, some form of light weaves its way through the atmosphere. Different types of light exist, and perform different functions for the surrounding environment. Some forms of light keep our circadian rhythm in check, ensuring that we can awaken and fall asleep at appropriate times of the day. Other forms of light provide us with certain types of vitamins that only our skin can properly absorb. Still, others cause some negative health effects, including cancer or insomnia.
There’s a lot of confusion out there about which ingredients are safe to use on your skin and which aren’t. The problem is that many people assume that all skin care products are safe for you. But it’s not as simple as that. In truth, if your skin care products are not natural, then it’s…
You may not be familiar their names, what function they perform to keep you healthy, or what gland produces them, but hormones play a vital role in how you feel both physically and mentally. Hormone imbalances are relatively common, and often go unnoticed. Their symptoms are general, varying, and nondescript, but can easily alter the course of your day.
According to the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention (CDC); “Ebola is a rare and deadly disease caused by infection with a strain of Ebola virus. The 2014 Ebola epidemic is the largest in history, affecting multiple countries in West Africa. The risk of an Ebola outbreak affecting multiple people in the U.S. is very low. What you need to know: Ebola is spread through direct contact with blood and body fluids of a person infected by and already showing.”
Lips – one of the most expressive and telling features on our faces – can often make or break our natural look. Each pair of lips varies, with some people priding themselves on pillow-plush lips, and others speaking through full, but smaller lips. We use them to speak, to smile, to express ourselves in unique but universal ways. But did you know that your lips can kiss and tell you a thing or two about your health?
One of my patients, Bill, called to make an appointment at my general practice the other day. He called up the front desk, and when I answered, he seemed almost exasperated. “Hi, Bill,” I said. “A little early for your yearly check up, aren’t ya?”
Much of America has an obsession with turning back time to look better. Celebrities participate in plastic surgery (sometimes to a comical effect). Major name brands of cosmetics promise miraculous results with their fancy formulas.
Ever wish you could copy and paste a more youthful you onto your face, even if you are young already? Many people who have not even reached their middle thirties feel that extra years pile onto their faces and into their pores, even if they have not yet reached the typical time when most people start to worry about anti-aging. Large, congested pores can add years to your complexion, and may cause you to look dirty when you are perfectly clean.
