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Winterizing Your Skin

Once autumn arrives, Michael Panella can be found spending a lot of time outdoors. He loves taking on home projects that allow him to work in his back yard. But, the dropping temperature causes Michael’s rosacea, a flushing and redness of the skin, to flare up. “My cheeks, the bridge of my nose, it’s exacerbated tremendously by the cold,” says Michael. Skin conditions like rosacea, acne and dry skin generally worsen in the winter months. “The cold weather takes its toll on the skin; the second- forced hot air and the low humidity that causes indoor creates a big problem for the skin; and the third – are winds, winds are very, very traumatic for the skin,” explains Dr. Mitchell Chasin, Director of the Reflection Center for Skin and Body. Dermatologist, Dr. Mitchell Chasin says winterizing your skin in preparation for the cooler months ahead can make all the difference. “In the summer or in the fall time before their skin has become dry, before it’s become red and flaky; it’s much easier to prevent the skin from getting dry than to treat it once it has,” reports Dr. Chasin.

You’ll want to regularly use a moisturizer cream. Keep skin and body well hydrated and keep exposed skin of the face covered when outdoors. “What happens with dry skin in acne is there are little microscopic cracks in the surface of the skin, which let bacteria through the skin; with that, they may experience increasing levels of breakouts, blemishes, increasing amount of scar development, and when the skin is dry the scar developments start to be worst,” says Dr. Chasin.

 For acne and rosacea sufferers, there are a host of lasers that can effectively winterize your skin, including the Smoothbeam and Vbeam lasers. Certain types of these therapies should be initiated early in winter to prevent worsening of acne and rosacea. “What we find is if we treat the skin with lasers and decrease the number of blood vessels on the surface of the skin, if we use lasers to treat these abnormal blood vessels that have developed on the surface of the skin patients experience less flushing, less redness,” reports Dr. Chasin.

Avoiding long hot showers, spicy foods and alcohol can also help maintain the skin’s moisture. Intense pulse light therapy is one of the most common technologies used to treat rosacea. After a series of treatments it can significantly reduce the redness and visible blood vessels on the face. Photodynamic therapy can significantly improve moderate to severe acne, including cystic acne. These treatments inactivate the bacteria that trigger acne, exfoliate the skin to unclog pores and decrease the activity of overactive sebaceous glands in the skin.

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