Dear Health Conscious Reader,
I wasted a lot of money on over-the-counter lotions, serums, and night creams. Eventually I figured out they just weren’t doing anything. Now I know why… they never made it into my skin.
Let me explain …
Your skin normally holds 10 to 20 percent water. But as you age, that number can drop below 10 percent. And without enough moisture, your skin becomes loose, dry, and wrinkled… adding years to your age.
It all has to do with something called hyaluronic acid (HA). HA is the ultimate skin hydrator. It has the wonderful ability to attract water and plump up your skin. In fact, it can absorb 1,000 times its weight in water!
Your body automatically produces plenty of HA in your younger years. The problem is, as you age, the amount of HA available to maintain plump, healthy skin decreases. According to studies, this may be one of the reasons your skin changes as you age.1
Worse, if you’re out in the sun a lot, if you smoke, or if you eat a lot of processed foods, you can lose hyaluronic acid at a much faster rate.2
Without hyaluronic acid, you lose volume in your skin. And suddenly, wrinkles and fine lines appear. But when your skin has enough HA, all that water helps to keep your skin smooth, supple, and wrinkle-free.
HA is so effective at smoothing away wrinkles that it’s the key ingredient in popular dermal fillers like Juvederm and Restylane.
A lot of my patients ask about these fillers. Many of them have flirted with the idea of injectables, but have concerns about artificially reducing lines and wrinkles.
There is no need to worry. Hyaluronic acid is a molecule that occurs naturally in your own body. Licensed professionals simply inject tiny amounts of it into your skin to replace the HA you’ve lost during the aging process.
The side effects are minimal – maybe a little pain, redness, and swelling right afterward. But they don’t last long. And you’ll love the end results. These fillers are great at reducing fine lines, plumping up your lips, and diminishing the folds between your mouth and nose.
But if you’re not ready for an injection, you can still receive the benefits of HA. It can produce significant results with topical use. That’s because, unlike many skin care ingredients that simply sit on top of your skin, it is easily absorbed and penetrates down into the deepest layer of your skin tissue.3
However, when you purchase an HA topical product, check to ensure that it contains only natural ingredients. This is very important, because hyaluronic acid also acts as a “carrier.” That means it will carry every ingredient in the formula deeply into your cells.
So make certain your choice of hyaluronic acid moisturizer is free of things like propylene glycol, parabens, PABA, PEG, and mineral oil.
Best Wishes for Health and Beauty,
Tara Smith, ARNP, NP-C
[Ed. Note: Tara Smith, ARNP NP-C, is a board-certified nurse practitioner for Dr. Sears’ Center for Health & Wellness in Royal Palm Beach, FL. Her medical concentration is on aesthetics, teaching, and family practice. Tara is conducting research trials into novel ways of naturally boosting human growth hormone and working on a new book, on anti-aging for women.]- Meyer LJ, Stern R. “Age-dependent changes of hyaluronan in human skin,” J Invest Dermatol; 1994 Mar; 102(3):385-9.
- Averbeck M et al. (2007) “Differential regulation of hyaluronan metabolism in the epidermal and dermal compartments of human skin by UVB irradiation.” J Invest Dermatol 127:687-697.
- Brown TJ, Alcorn D, Fraser JR. “Absorption of hyaluronan applied to the surface of intact skin,” J Invest Dermatol; 1999, vol. 113; 740-746.
- “Enviro-Health Links – Outdoor Air Pollution.” Department of Health and Human Services. http://sis.nlm.nih.gov/enviro/outdoorairpollution.html#a4. Accessed 09/09/10.
- “Corticol Level.” Medline Plus. http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/003693.htm. Accessed 09/09/10.