Yes, polypodium leucotomus, aka ‘Fern block’, is a consolidated supplements which is supposed to protect the skin (at dosages maybe higher than 250 mg/d). Now, the protection is relative to many factors, but this and astaxanthin (again, the dosage seems low) seem to be the two specific skin protectors. Collagen and hyaluronic acid seem to be 2 well-known protective or regenerative ingredients. Niacinamide also targets the skin reaction to light rays.
Bottom line, that seems to be a legit supplement, although the dosages might be varied.
Last summer I tried polypodium 500 mg + astaxanthin 8 mg + B3 50 mg, with no apparent effect on my intolerance to strong solar radiation. Just a n=1 anedocte. I’ll try again next year, starting maybe in March.
SKINCARE. Prompted by this thread, I’ve started to tackle this topic and the first impression is probably the feeling I would have landing on an alien planet. I don’t know if other forum users share the same experience.
On the other side, this constitutes a good cognitive challenge. The approach should be based, as done in other fields, on some basic rules: discriminate the sources, try to grab the governing principles, try to adapt the rules to your individual genetic makeup and situation. And there is some fun in the discovery, trying to develop a personalized skincare routine, trying to optimize products, costs and time. It’s sort of a game and I’m starting to enjoy it.
I found a good source in the book of Victoria fu and gloria Wu, the chemists previously suggested by Admin. Decoding Skincare. Pretty good basic book on basic principles by competent authors with no conflicts of interest.
It seems that the book has been presently expanded in a 2nd edition, I missed it by a few days. But it is not available everywhere.
Another source I found useful is some podcasts from aesthetic surgeons and dermatologists. Reliability must be judged. There are sometimes blatant conflicts of interest, but these are often separated from the principles they expound.
Another interesting thing to think about is the healthy skin microbiome. An esthetician friend of mine has been harping on me to reduce using creams that have lots of preservatives as it can be disruptive to sensitive skin’s microbiome (I have a bit of rosacea). So I stumbled on this study today:
I wonder if we’ll start seeing probiotic products for skin a lot more going forward.
I’ve seen that they are starting to be marketed, the 1st I found with a quick search: bombastic marketing and high price, but at least they do specify the bacterium species. The advertising hype is formidable. I could barely hold my self from clicking the ‘buy’ button.
How does it work ?
Inspired by cutting-edge research in skin science and patented tribiotic complex, our serum introduces the power of youth probiotics—essential element given by mothers at birth, which diminishes with age—reintroducing their benefits to rejuvenate the skin. It is also packed with lifting marine prebiotic and postbiotic lactic acid which are effective cell renewal, lifting and plumping ingredients that acts on loss of firmness and bring a radiant look.
A brand called Mother Dirt was all the rage a few years ago. Many people swore it transformed their problem skin. I never see anything about it anymore?
Just remember tret makes your skin more sun sensitive, so you need to use spf on those areas or they may become worse than when you started.
@Dr.Bart my derm advised me against using any strength I’d use on my body due to the large area because she worries about toxicity. Because of that, I’ll use lotions designed for the body that have barely anything in it. Thoughts?
Seems like an extremely low risk from what I can find:
A 31-year-old man ingested 1000 mg of tretinoin (100 pills of Vesanoid 10 mg) in a suicide attempt. He developed nonbloody diarrhea, but otherwise had no complaints. Clinical examination was normal. The patient was treated with activated charcoal and was hydrated. The patient’s blood results did not show any deterioration on the third consecutive day. He was discharged well on the third day, but was subsequently lost to follow-up.
Yes, personally I would not use my Musely tretinoin 0.1% directly all over my body. I usually use a pea size amount in to body cream 1:10-20 ratio and use it 2-3/ weeks.
That’s a serious point.
We can presume that those products advertised by young and gorgeous models will hopefully prevent skin aging to an extent, the only purpose useful to nearly perfect skin. Manteinance.
What about older and uglier real people, with various degrees of damage already existing? Some prevention for the remaining span of time on earth keeps being useful, but again what about the theoretical remediation of flaws like black spots, small wrinkles, and other imperfections?
Honestly the most effective but not without risks are lasers that basically remove the top layer of skin and target dark spots and blood vessels. There are different kinds. They are expensive. And even those are not going to be a complete miracle reset from the before and afters I have seen.
I went to do a consultation for issues with Rosacea and mild sun damage and it was going to be a few thousand dollars for 3 treatments with “Fotona Starwalker”. I’m still considering it, but it’ll be a while for me to pull the trigger on something like this. I’m trying to see what results I can get to with red light therapy in a year and then reassess.
Yes, dark spots, sorry for the inaccuracy, it will take some time to become accurate with the terminology.
I have a number of such dark spots, since I live in a coastal place where it’s tradition in the summer to go to the beach. Actually, people who were not tanned in the summer were considered sick and colored skin is still considered a beautiful skin, more than a pale or whitish one. This is the power of culture and tradition, we were encouraged to expose to the sun.
I’ve been going to the beach from age 2, probably my skin should be far worse if we consider the cumulative exposure. True enough, after 30 I started becoming intolerant to UV rays so I had to decrease the exposure, which due to reflection phenomena from the sand and the water surface is pretty huge from May to September, even though in middle latitudes (about 42°N).
