Category: Skin Care

For many of us, the summer months are also the months when we are at our most physically active: running, cycling, swimming, you name it, we’re outside doing it. However, the same sunlight that inspires us to be more active, can also be hindering our performance and damaging our skin in ways that can go unnoticed until it’s too late. At MacDonald’s Pharmacy, we protect against dehydration in a variety of ways.

Physical Performance

Dehydration is always a factor in mental health and physical performance, but during these hot summer months, it is even more important to watch for the warning signs. By the time you are aware of the symptoms, your body is already experiencing dehydration, and your performance could be suffering. It is important to take active preventative steps to ensure that our bodies have what they need.

Some of the signs of dehydration include a feeling of mental fogginess, chapped lips and burning eyes. Your brain is 70% water, so every time you drink water, you’re helping your body function properly. Even a 4% loss of water can cause memory loss and otherwise adversely affect your cognitive thinking. Nutrition – particularly hydration – is one of the few changes that people can make in their lives that can cause them to start feeling better right away.

Water is obviously critical to staying hydrated, but the body also needs vitamins and minerals to perform properly. Unfortunately, most of us don’t get enough nutrients from the foods that we eat as part of our regular diets. To supplement our summer diets, we offer Mason Natural supplements. Mason Natural offers more than 400 vitamins, supplements and herbs for the entire family.

Hydrating Skin Care

We also need to take additional precautions for the portions of our bodies that are consistently exposed to direct sunlight for extended periods of time.

At MacDonald’s Pharmacy, we proudly carry RX Skin Therapy, a revolutionary skin care line “that combines the most powerful pharmaceuticals with the finest natural ingredients to deliver advanced scientific formulas used to cleanse, correct, hydrate and protect.”

RX Skin Therapy offers cleansers, moisturizers, masques, exfoliants and serums for every skin type, whether it’s normal, dry or oily.

Together, we can establish a plan that will help to enhance your performance and protect your skin that doesn’t involve staying indoors. Just is just another way that we help navigate each person’s journey to achieving their optimal health – inside and out.

A facial peel is one type of cosmeceutical (cosmetic products that are compounded with pharmaceutical grade ingredients) that we compound here at MacDonald’s Pharmacy. People can use a facial peel for many things such as photo-aging, brown spots, melasma, etc. A facial peel can be very superficial, superficial, medium, or deep. The deeper the peel, the longer the healing and recovery process. However, you can see more dramatic results with deeper peels.

A facial peel uses many chemical agents:

• Salicylic Acid
  Commonly used for acne. It has anti-inflammatory and antimicrobial properties. It also has an anesthetic effect that helps decrease the amount of redness and discomfort. These are generally associated with peels.
• Glycolic Acid
  Used for many indications, like actinic keratosis, hyper- and hypo-pigmentation, melasma and photo-aging. The doctor’s office often performs these higher-concentration peels.
• Gluconic and Mandelic Acids
  Less-irritating acids due to their high molecular weight. These acids are best for patients with darker or sensitive skin, treating acne, photo-aging and rosacea.
• Retinoic Acid
  Used in peels in concentrations ranging from three to five percent. This yellow peel must remain on the face for six to 12 hours before being washed off. It has many clinical benefits, such as helping to soften skin texture, decreasing wrinkles, improving skin color and increasing dermal volume. The recommended use is once a week. However, under a doctor’s order, this is an office procedure.
• Jessner’s Solution
  Used for many indications including acne, photo-aging, hyper- or hypo-pigmentation and melasma. This peel gives you a high amount of exfoliation, is low in toxicity and is safe for patients with sensitive skin.
• Trichloroacetic Acid (TCA)
  Works by precipitating proteins and causing necrosis on the skin. It creates a real frost on the skin during application. It is used as a superficial peel at 10-25 percent and a medium depth peel at 35-50 percent.
• Phenol
  Used in deep facial peel applications. This peel is performed at the doctor’s office under general anesthesia or heavy sedation. It is dispensed in sterile amber glass vials. A highly trained doctor must perform this. Results may be permanent, but recovery is a long process. It could take up to six months to recover but patients can use makeup to cover up the peel areas seven days after application.

There are some things we can do to help speed up and heal the peeling process once it is complete. Generally, the patient has to wait at least one week before applying any products on the skin. We do not want to kill the inflammation; you want to keep the irritation for best results. We can use products such as aloe vera, vitamin E and emu oil. It is also a recommendation to use a sunscreen agent, a skin smoothing agent such as calendula, green tea or chamomile and a short-term use of a corticosteroid to help with edema on the skin.

Summer is coming to an end, and our tans will soon begin to fade as well. You may want to turn to a sunbed to keep your tan lasting all year long, but is it really worth it? Well, research shows that it is not. Using a sun bed is one of the easiest ways to get and keep a tan, but it’s also one of the most dangerous ways. We can’t ignore the long-term health risks associated with sunbeds just for the short-term gain of having a tan.

“Modern sunbeds work by exposing the user to UV radiation which can be the equivalent of Mediterranean sunlight at midday in August,” says Dr. Miriam McCarthy, Consultant at the Public Health Agency (PHA). Using a sunbed once a month or more increases your risk of developing skin cancer, and if you use them before the age of 35, you significantly increase your risk of developing melanoma.

Binge sessions in tanning salons by young people can lead to:

• Cancer
• Premature aging
• Eye damage

Marbeth Ferguson, the Skin Cancer Prevention Coordinator at Cancer Focus NI said that skin cancer diagnoses have increased by almost 20%. People are ignoring the risks of using sunbeds, but Ferguson advises that no one should be using them.

If you have a concern about skin cancer, such as having a mole that’s changed in size, shape or color, you should definitely talk to your doctor right away. Early detection of cancer is vital and you should regularly be checking your skin.