Lifestyle Choices

4 Gravity and Wrinkles Causes

The whole universe is held together by gravity. The movements of the earth around the sun (determining the seasons) and of the moon around the earth (regulating the tides) are all according to the invisible force of gravity. Although gravity makes life possible (and helps people walk rather than float!), we are not often conscious of gravity’s effect on our appearance. (more…)

Six major causes of our facial wrinkles:

1 Natural or “intrinsic” aging

Natural, biologic aging is responsible for the inevitable thinning of our skin accompanied by the loss of structural collagen and elastic tissue. The good news is that this biologic aging is the least important of the causes of wrinkles on your face. (more…)

When you take the time to ask “Why?” science will always answer “How”. In the case of wrinkles, as you learn why they appear, you can also learn how to prevent or postpone their appearance, plus how to eliminate many of the wrinkles you already have. It’s never too late to care for your skin, to prevent more wrinkles from appearing, and to soften those already present. It’s never too late to look and feel younger! (more…)

Some wrinkles are superficial; some can be deeper. The good news is that, as a scientist and a dermatologist, I can assure you that almost all wrinkles can be either prevented, or at least successfully treated!

How do you make your skin, and therefore yourself, look better and younger without expending a great deal of time and effort? Of course you can prevent new wrinkles from forming, starting today! (more…)

GoreTex is a synthetic material composed of interconnected fibrils of expanded polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE). You may recognize Gore- Tex as the lightweight fabric used to make insulating ski jackets, but GoreTex fibers are even more interesting as surgical implants. They have been used for almost 30 years as surgical vascular grafts and more recently for implants in the skin.

GoreTex patches can be placed just under the skin of the nose to give a smooth profile to previously unaesthetic indentations, and can be threaded under the deep folds between the nose and the mouth to smooth the grooves. (more…)

As you now realize, most of our larger wrinkles are caused by repeated facial expressions: frowning, squinting, smiling, grimacing or raising our eyebrows, or sometimes by moving one side of our face more than the other. With time, our facial wrinkles begin to show our facial habits. (more…)

“Skin Bleaching” Medical Surgery Basic Procedure

Before a chemical peel, the doctor may recommend that the face be “pre-treated” with a special exfoliating cleanser, with retinoic acid, or with alpha-hydroxy acids so that the peel procedure can be performed on a more even skin surface. Just before the peel, the doctor may ask the patient to wash his or her face thoroughly. Then he or she will clean the patient’s face extensively with alcohol oracetone, rubbing the superficial oil from the skin. (more…)

The use of chemicals to “peel away” unwanted or dead skin is a practice with a past. Chemical face peeling can be traced back to ancient Egypt, where creams of alabaster particles suspended in milk and honey were applied to the face for “tightening”. The Egyptians also used animal oils mixed with salt and natural minerals, and plant substances to “exfoliate” their faces. Later, poultices containing mustard, sulfur and limestone were used. (more…)

Acne usually starts as a few blackheads on the nose and forehead and a few inflamed papules also appear often on a greasy skin. Often the spots come in crops so that there are times in between without any spots. Many girls have a bout of acne around the time of their period.

Cosmetics

Very greasy or oily cosmetics are best avoided because they can block up the follicles and make acne worse. This may happen under a fringe when the hair may prevent the grease escaping. Disagreement about the best advice partly stems from the fact that in America they used to have a lot of trouble with greasy make-up causing acne. In Britain most doctors are happy to allow the use of noncomedogenic foundation, moisturizers etc. Some people gain much confidence if they can hide their spots. (more…)

Most people will need advice from their doctor to help in the treatment of moderate or severe acne. Generally doctors will start with cheap, safe agents which have few side effects and only if these fail will they recommend medication to be taken by mouth.

Topical preparations (onto the skin)

Benzoyl peroxide

This has been around for more than thirty years but we do not yet know fully how it works. It loosens blackheads and kills bacteria but has other effects as well. It comes in strengths from two-and-a-half to twenty per cent and may be bought as a cream, gel or a wash. Examples are given in the previous section. (more…)

Pigment

The pigment in our skin is called melanin and this same substance gives color to our hair and eyes. Fair -skinned people have only a little melanin while those with dark skins have a lot. The main function of melanin is to protect the skin from ultraviolet in the sun’s rays.

Vitiligo

Intensive research, around the world, has so far failed to reveal the trigger for vitiligo or the mechanism. We know that antibodies against the melanocyte are found in the blood, that antibodies against the thyroid gland are also present but that they seem to do no harm. (more…)

Birthmarks

It would be logical if all birthmarks were present at birth. This is not always the case. Some marks appear in the first few days of life but others can be delayed by months or years. In these cases it is thought that the fault resides in the skin from birth but only reveals itself when some other factor acts as a trigger. An example of this is the unusual problem called Becker’s nevus. It has the appearance, usually on the shoulder, of a large light brown patch, often with some coarse dark hair in it. It is first seen at puberty and is triggered by rising hormone levels. Salmon patches or stork bites derive their name from the old fable about babies being delivered down the chimney by a friendly stork whose beak has clasped the human bundle by the nape of the neck. These marks are seen in about a quarter of the population. Sometimes they are thought to have appeared in adult life but it is only that some new hair style or hair disease has revealed a patch that has really been present since birth. (more…)

The medical meaning of the word tumor is simply a swelling or lump raised above the skin surface. Although some tumors are cancers, most are not and the word can be applied to something as harmless as a wart.

Harmless skin lumps of one type or another are exceedingly common: in fact everyone has one or more at some time in their life. Although moles, which are raised, could also be considered here they are dealt with in detail in the section on birthmarks and pigment. This section deals with both harmless or benign lumps as well as true cancers or malignant lumps. (more…)

The Aniline or Oxidation Hair Colorants

The most permanent (and the most successful), these dyes are included in a number of products for colouring hair such as tinting shampoos, highlighting shampoos, and the single-step and double-step permanent colourants you can buy in packages at the chemist. They are permanent dyes, because the artificial pigment is made to penetrate into the cortex of the hair shaft. There it stays. How this happens is most interesting. (more…)

Viruses

Viruses are even smaller than bacteria and fungi and they are not usually found on normal skin. Many viruses can cause a rash - e.g. measles and glandular fever - but these diseases are not dealt with here. This section describes some virus infections in which either the only signs or the commonest signs of the disease are on the skin.

Warts

It is now known that there are several strains of wart virus and each tends to produce its own type of wart. Some cause the ordinary wart on the hands, others painful warts on the feet; and still others warts on the face or genitals. Warts are caught from other people. This happens easily in children who have not had time to develop immunity to the virus but adults are more resistant. Even when the virus has gained access to the skin it may lie dormant for weeks or months before the wart itself appears. (more…)

Holidays and sun

Many people find their psoriasis improves in the summer, particularly when on holiday. The beneficial side effects of ultraviolet light contribute to this improvement as do relaxation, exercise and decreased stress. Take all the holidays you are allowed.

General skin care

It may help to use a bath oil to get a film of oil onto your skin. Moisturizers help - E45, emulsifying ointment, aqueous creams are all good. Something stickier like Vaseline may be useful on plaques at times.

Scalp involvement is a nuisance and frequent hair-washing may be necessary - a short style makes this easier to cope with. (more…)

Roughly speaking, there are two kinds of dates, at least from a boy’s point of view. In one he feels drawn to a girl primarily by her physical attractiveness (which includes a certain seductiveness of personality) and will go as far as he has the boldness to try or as the girl will permit. In the other he is attracted by a girl’s whole personality, including her physical appeal, and wants to know her better; somewhere in the front or back of his mind is the thought that this might possibly turn out to be the exciting relationship of his life.

In a girl’s feelings also there are the two kinds of dates. But there is lots of evidence that a girl doesn’t distinguish so sharply and calculatingly as a boy; she tends to hope that any kind of dating relationship will turn into true love. (more…)

Women hate being efficient in the home. Lists and routines simply do not fit into the pink-check-gingham.. and-lace mental picture of the soap opera mother, which so many of us were brought up to be. When you become a working mother with any luck you will get twice as much out of life, but you can’t run your house as if you weren’t working. A working mother has to work faster and more efficiently in the home. She has to be twice as reliable outside it because people expect her not to be.

I have evolved my own system, which I slowly slip away from, but it pulls me back to reality at regular intervals, and heaven knows what I would be like without it. (more…)

There are two sorts of crisis: there is the personal one, such as the loss of a job or of a loved one by death or divorce, or the communal one, such as a motorway threat to a village, or a war. But there always seems to be some sort of crisis.

When personal disaster strikes, you probably need sympathy and practical help; but there is a distinct possibility (especially if everyone else is also swimming for the lifeboats) that the only person who is always interested in you, and able to provide you with sustained help is … YOURSELF.

Don’t think ’somebody ought to do something about it’ or `the government should see to it’. Start thinking in terms of self-reliance. What you can do and what you can’t do — that may be all you can count on. Whatever your crisis, force yourself to look cheerful. Shakespeare said: ‘ There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so’, and Napoleon added that `the moral is to material as three to one’. I would also say that the quickest face lift is a smile. Go on — try it, just for today SMILE and try to find something good instead of something bad in every new situation. (more…)

For sparkling bright beauties, start with the right tools:

• Several small, round-tipped sable brushes for applying color to lids, under lower lashes; also essential for blending.
• Flat, fan-shaped brush to apply more than a single color at a time or to cover large areas with bright shadows.
• Eyelash/eyebrow brush. This handy duo does two jobs: one side smooths brows, the little comb on the other side separates lashes. What not to use: a pin, a bent paperclip, a comb handle; any of these could slip, causing serious eye damage.
• Cotton powderpuff to “set” eye makeup with translucent powder.
• Large, fluffy brush to remove excess translucent powder.

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