How many of us here moisturise to a strict regime
regularly?
(I know for the guys, Lau does! 
Good work, Lau! I think Gack does too... where in the
world is Gack? Long time no see liao! 
)
I stick to a daily morning skincare ritual and a night-time one as
well, and I've been especially vigilant since coming to Melbourne
where the weather's much drier and the strong sunlight can really
wreck havoc on one's skin! 
Anyways, here's a very interesting article based on a recent
episode of "What's Good For You" shown on Aussie Ch 9. They really
put moisturisers to the test and wouldn't you like to know the
results?
Do moisturisers make a difference?
Moisturiser is essentially a mixture of oil and water. It's
supposed to attract and retain water in the outer level of your
skin to give you that youthful glow but does it really make a
difference?
According to dermatologist Dr Natasha Cook, the enzymes that help
renew our skin do need moisture to function properly.
"If the skin's not kept moist the enzymes don't work and the skin
doesn't exfoliate," Dr Cook says. "We get clumpy dry skin, which
doesn't look great or feel great either."
Reporter Brooke Hanson is going to see if moisturiser actually
helps keep your skin moist.
The test
Brooke and her three fellow volunteers are going to go without
moisturiser for four days and have their skin's moisture levels
measured. They will then use a range of moisturisers for another
four days and their skin will be re-tested to see if it's made any
difference.
Brooke's fellow lab rat, Steven, is a bar manager in Sydney whose
job takes a heavy toll on his skin.
"It is quite a tough environment on my skin," Stephen claims, "with
air conditioning running constantly, people smoking all around me
and it's pretty hot when people start dancing."
Steven has oily skin and moisturises twice a week.
Fellow test subject Tiina is a naturopath whose job takes her into
all kinds of environments. She has combination skin; oily across
the centre and drier at the sides.
"There are some days I don't moisturise at all," says Tiina. "I'm
very sporadic with my skin regime."
Sound engineer Jules is like most Australian men. He doesn't
believe in moisturiser and has never used the stuff.
"I don't think I need to use moisturiser but I guess the tests will
prove that," he says.
As for Brooke, swimming is her life and she spends three hours in
the pool every day.
"My skin gets so dry from the chlorine that I moisturise four times
a day," says Brooke.
The first step is for all four test subjects not to moisturise at
all.
"I managed to last four days without moisturiser but my skin feels
like leather," says Brooke. "It's really dry and flaky and full of
dry patches. Yuck!"
In climate-controlled conditions, with a temperature of 20 degrees
and humidity at 50 percent, our four subjects have five readings
taken from their faces and an average moisture level
calculated.
For well-hydrated skin you need a reading of 45 plus.
Our first guinea pig Steven is pretty close at 44.4. Jules is 42.6,
Tiina's on 56 and Brooke is the worst 40.6.
With the hydration level of their skin calculated, the next stage
of the experiment is for three of them to use three different
moisturisers twice a day, over four days.
Steven gets a brand designed especially for men, retailing at $60.
Tiina will use a $25 cream from the supermarket. Brooke is spoilt
with a top-range cream, costing $120 a pot. Jules will use nothing
at all as a control for the test.
The results
After four days of testing their chosen cream (with Jules using
nothing at all), it's time to head to the lab to see the
results.
Brooke's score on the first test was a very dry 40.6. It turns out
that expensive moisturiser has done the trick and her hydration
level has risen to 59.8.
"I'm honestly really surprised," says Brooke. "I can't believe my
moisture content on my face has gone up so much since we last
tested."
Tiina's cheap supermarket cream increased her hydration levels to
more than 67. Steven's went up to 56.
And Jules? Well, he never moisturises but after an unusually long
week working in air conditioning, his hydration levels fell from 42
to 33.
The three who used moisturiser
all showed a big improvement. Unfortunately, Jules didn't use
anything and dried up. Let that be a lesson to you
guys!
"I think I will be using moisturiser in the future," laughs Jules.
"I've been told I will look like a wrinkled old man in the not too
distant future, so let's stop the ageing."
"We need to use a moisturiser
to basically make our skin not only look better and feel better but
function better," says Dr Cooke. "Moisturisers are really important
to hold water in the skin, and when we hold the water in the skin
we keep the skin soft and the skin itself functions more
effectively."
So we need moisturiser but do we need to pay a high price?
Brooke paid $120 for a top brand cream and her skin improved by 47
percent. Tiina shelled out just $25 for her cream and saw less
improvement on the face of it the expensive moisturiser was worth
it, however, Brooke's skin was much, much drier than Tiina's to
begin with.
"Price isn't the most important
thing about the moisturiser that you choose," claims Dr Cook. "What
is important is what's in the actual product."
Great news for the family budget as long as a product has the key
ingredients, you don't have to pay a fortune for good skin.
These key ingredients are glycerine, lanolin or petrolatum, and silicone. If it's got those,
it'll be good to your skin.
Are moisturisers good at preventing wrinkles too, as many adverts
claim?
"Moisturisers don't stop wrinkles; they just temporarily make them
look better. And certainly dry skin per se does not cause ageing of
the skin, that's more complicated," says Dr Cook. "It's due to
internal factors and it's due to what we do to ourselves,
particularly getting sun exposure and sun damage, which is the
biggest single cause of ageing of the skin."
The lesson is to apply sun block every day.
Conclusion
Moisturising regularly will help keep your skin in shape and while
you're at it, slap some on your body too it needs just as much
attention. And invest in a good sun block.
As for you guys, as Jules discovered, real men do moisturise!
Taken from : http://health.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=154808
