News
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Bright-I Serum On Sale
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March 2010 - Newsletter #56 - Retinoids, Spot Peel
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FAQs for Beginners
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TCA Spot Peel Kit
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Bonus Offer
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MARCH Bonus - Free with orders of $150 and above
Celebrate the coming of Spring with our Celestite Spritz, before or after makeup or during the day it provides a refrshing lift to the skin.
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How to design a test to give you the results you want
A very good client of ours sent us this link: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn18525-antiageing-cream-as-good-as-drug-at-reducing-wrinkles.html The article supposedly shows that some "cosmetics" are better than retinoic acid, the anti-age prescription medicine. If you read our forum and newsletters, you will see that I always say that retinoic acid is great, but it has to be supplemented. Why? You can ask your skin to renew itself, and that is what retinoic acid does, but when you ask that to aging skin, you need to give it also the building materials to do the job. I say that it is unfair to compare retinoic acid by itself with a trio of products (Olay pro-X) that provides those building materials. A more fair experiment would have been to compare retinoic acid plus SAS let's make collagen serum against that same trio. Or alpha/beta plus collagen serum, or any combination of skin renewal promotion PLUS building blocks. It is not that the scientist asked to design the experiments did not know what he was doing: he did, and he was paid for an experimental design that he knew would favor Olay. But we can read between the lines, can't we? That kind of experiments are a way of cheating. We are supposed to compare apples with apples. Don't expect that from most skin care companies. Incidentally, there are no exotic ingredients in Olay Pro-X, just good actives that have been shown to work, like sunscreen, niacinamide, carnosine, caffeine for the eye area, etc., plus some silicones and mica that will make the wrinkles less noticeable. As I said, not fair.
New! Sun spot treatment kit
 We have been talking for a long time about releasing this product. Because of my exposure to the sun when I was a child and my lab work I have many sun spots and have used this treatment on my face and arms several times. I know how useful it can be. After long discussions, we finally came to an agreement about how to make this treatment available to our clients. The kit will consist of half a milliliter of a strong acidic solution, plus applicators and Restoration cream. Why such a small volume? This type of acid should not be used on a large area of skin unless you are at a doctor's office. The volume supplied with the kit will be enough for the treatment of two or three spots, and this can be done safely at home. What to expect? A few minutes of mild discomfort, followed by immediate relief when the acid is stopped by the Restoration cream, which will also shorten the healing time. The healing time will depend on the area of your body you are treating: for example, the face will heal faster than the arm. The treated area will look ugly for about a week, but the new skin should be clean and light. In short: this kit can be magic for those of us that are bothered by the odd sun spot on our face or hands, but will NOT do for a "peel". I hope we will make many people happy: no need for pre-treatment, no expensive fees. But we at Skin Actives will never try to replace your MD. We will post a (very boring) video on Youtube showing how to apply the acid, how the skin gets "frosted" and when the Restoration cream is applied. Questions? Write to me at info@skinactives.com
About stretch marks
Stretch marks are part of life, but we don't have to like them. It is possible to prevent stretch marks from appearing in the first place, at least to some extent: if you are pregnant, or if you are in the process of gaining or losing weight, apply rose hip oil to your skin every night. It helps, a lot. How to fix them once they happened? Don't trust those who promise miracle cures, they don't exist, at least not for stretch marks. Try our let's make collagen serum and layer rose hip oil on top.
The next newsletter
I was writing a small section on "pseudo-scientific ideas that are acceptable only in the skin care industry" and then I realized that there were so many crazy things out there that there will be material for several newsletters. In science, you don't get to publish theories or hypotheses in good journals unless there is solid experimental evidence to support them. A scientist performs experiments to test a hypothesis and the results is what matters. If the results contradict your initial ideas, it is time to think again. But things are different in the skin care industry. Here, anything goes. Suppose that you say that a short peptide applied to your skin will paralyze muscles and erase some wrinkles. Does it happen? No, but you can still draw a cute cartoon of how the peptide is supposed to work, and this is enough for the marketing campaign. And it is good that it does NOT work, because you could not go around selling a product that paralyzes the muscles as if it were candy. That would be illegal, dangerous and would bankrupt the company because of the dangerous side effects. The problem is that most people don't know enough biochemistry and molecular biology to know what is possible at this stage of scientific development, or even ever. Some of the schemes proposed in those advertisements are simply incompatible with life as we know it. Others are not yet possible although they might be if certain technology, at present non existent, were to be developed. More about this in the newsletter for February 2010. And it looks like it will be one of those "Hannah's rants".
Why a bird poop facial?
http://www.shizukany.com/geisha-facial.htm Should we go back to the days when bird poop was the only thing an actor could use to beautify his/her skin? Or should we take advantage of what we have learned since 1850? In 1850 there were no vaccines, no antibiotics, no understanding that many illnesses are caused by germs, bacteria and virus had not been discovered yet, there was no cure for practically anything. People had to resort to magic. If applying bird poop to your skin makes you happy, do it. But think about WHY you need bird poop to make you feel like you are doing something good for your skin. Some people think that old times were better. They forget about the hunger, the filth, the pollution, the pests and the poverty, the cold. For these people, bird poop will always be better than EGF and CoQ10.
I had a "facial"
...and it was lovely. It felt great, and it was not terribly expensive. We have several Massage Envy in the Valley, and they started a new program of facial treatments using Murad. I am not saying that Murad is great, no, the facial was great. It was done in a massage bed, and while the esthetician was waiting for something to happen (like in the acid exfoliation and the mask) she did massage arms, neck and back. The facial consisted (as far as I can remember) of a cleanser, acid exfoliation, water vapor (to soften the comedos), removal of comedos and blackheads, toner, mask, removal of mask and moisturizer. I gave an excuse so that the esthetician would not talk to me, because the facial is actually an excuse to sell products. In short: if you feel you need some TLC, a facial is a good way of getting it. But if you are planning to relax, ask for some quiet time. My skin? No difference that I could tell, but I felt great. This should work even better (and cheaper) doing it in pairs with a friend and using Skin Actives products, using alpha/beta exfoliator and the rest of the products depending on your needs: acne, anti-age, antioxidation, skin brightening o whatever. That would be a nice gift for anybody: an IOU for a facial done by you to your mother (hint, hint) or friend.
Better late than never: H1N1 vaccine
Went to the supermarket (Safeway) for apples and got two shots; seasonal flu and H1N1. Because of my age is very probably that I have encountered a grandfather of H1N1 long ago but the pharmacist made it very easy (and only $15) to get the vaccine and i got it. To appreciate how science has changed things, please see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Death and javascript:void(0) http://trailblazing.royalsociety.org/ Year 1755 Sir Hans Sloane gives a fascinating account of how the practice of variolation was introduced to England, this being an operation ‘performed by making a very slight incision in the skin of the arm’ and introducing into it ‘a dossil dipped in the ripe matter of a favourable kind of small-pox’. This would then induce a milder disease that protected against a more severe natural infection. Sloane describes how the procedure (reports of its efficacy had arrived from abroad) was first tested on six condemned criminals and subsequently on ‘half a dozen of the charity-children belonging to St. James’s parish’. Variolation became popular, especially among the upper classes, until it was eventually replaced by vaccination. The remarkable Sir Hans is also credited with ‘inventing’ milk chocolate.
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