Want to keep your skin looking young?
The market is flooded with products that claim to rejuvenate skin. But natural solutions are often just as effective.
Whether your skin is dull, sun-damaged, or shows signs of aging, here are our top skin rejuvenation tips including a natural, non-invasive treatment that has become far more popular for skincare treatment.
Diet and Exercise for Skin Rejuvenation
If there was one thing you could eliminate from your diet that would give you better skin, would you do it? Eliminate sugar! Sugar is everywhere, whether the label says high fructose corn syrup, sugar, sucrose, glucose, dextrose, maltodextrin, or any of the other sixty names for sugar. Sugars are a bigger part of our diet than we might realize. One way to virtually eliminate them is to cut down on processed food.
Hydration is also very important. Many people are chronically dehydrated. Staying hydrated will help move water-soluble nutrients around your body, including vitamins that promote skin health. Drinking plenty of water will make your skin cells plump up like tiny water balloons. Meanwhile, surgary drinks are clearly to be avoided.
Vegetables are a major part of any healthy diet. They are some of the best 'antioxidant rich' foods. Antioxidants help keep the skin healthy.
The most common antioxidants are vitamin A, vitamin C, and vitamin E. These are found in high amounts in various organic vegetables. Where possible, eat veggies fresh for the best antioxidant effect.
Exercise can also be good for the skin, and it has so many other benefits. Exercise promotes blood flow to bring oxygen and nutrients to the skin and increases lymph flow to remove waste and toxins. Exercise also indudes sweat, which helps detox the body. Plus, you’ll enjoy a healthy glow after a good workout!
Next, let’s look at some proven skincare routines.
Skincare Routines to Rejuvenate Your Skin
For many people, skincare means a shower and some facial moisturizer. You can improve your skin significantly by adding a few simple habits to your routine.
Cleanse the Skin Regularly
To get more radiant skin, we recommend cleansing thoroughly but gently .
- In the morning, freshen up your face with lukewarm water and follow with your favorite moisturizer or facial oil.
- Avoid heavy makeup that clogs pores. Your skin needs to breathe.
- In the evening, use a cleansing oil to remove makeup, sunscreen, and the grime of the day. Remove the oil with a gentle cleanser.
- Hot water strips oils from your skin, so it may help to turn the temperature of the water in the shower down a bit.
Exfoliate for Better Skin
Exfoliation involves gently removing dead skin cells. Dead cells cause dull skin so regular exfoliation will rejuvenate your skin and improve skin texture. There are two types of exfoliation: mechanical and chemical. Mechanical exfoliation is done with scrubbing pads or brushes.
Chemical exfoliation is done with products that contain hyaluronic acid that gently removes dead skin cells. Avoid harsh exfoliating scrubs which can cause micro-tears on the skin and invite infection.
Soothe your Skin with Vitamins
Take your skin’s vibrancy to the next level with serums that contain high concentrations of beneficial ingredients including Vitamin C, Vitamin B3 (Niacinamide), ferulic acid, and resveratrol.
Serums should be applied after exfoliation for the best effect. Keep in mind, any serum containing an acid may cause unwanted reactions in sensitive individuals.
How to Moisturize your Skin
After you’ve cleansed, exfoliated, and applied a serum, apply moisturizing lotion or facial oil. Opt for moisturizers with gentle, natural ingredients. If you have dry skin, you can use a toner that creates a water barrier to lock in the skin’s moisture. Follow that with a moisturizer or facial oil.
Detox your Skin
Treat yourself to a weekly face mask. Once you’ve got a daily skincare routine in place, reinforce your practices with the luxurious experience of a once-weekly face mask. Face masks are also used after exfoliation to promote detoxification, moisturization, and the absorption of nutrients. It’s a great way to feel like you’re at the spa!
Support Your Skin From Inside Out
One important way to slow skin aging is to stimulate collagen production.
- It may help to take a collagen supplement. It could take at least a month before you notice any results.
- Use products with retinoids (derived from vitamin A) to stimulate collagen growth. Keep in mind that these products may cause unwanted reactions in some individuals.
- Use red light therapy to boost collagen and elastin production.
Optimize your photobiomodulation sessions by allowing the therapeutic wavelengths to be in direct contact with your skin. The powerful light particles absorb best without applications of topical creams or serums, which can influence scattering of the light particles. With PlatinumLEDs medical grade lights all you need to do to start your healing journey is shine the light and simply receive.
Functional Medicine Doctor of Physical Therapy, Dr. Alayna Newton, PT, DPT, FAFS
Curb Bad Habits to Preserve your Skin
Once you incorporate great habits, don’t undo your efforts by continuing bad habits that will cause aging.
Wear Sun Protection
Apply sunscreen with a high SPF that is free of harmful chemicals or limit sun exposure whenever you’re spending time outdoors, especially between 10:00 and 3:00 when UV rays are at their strongest.
The European Commission has published an amended regulation regarding a limit to the use of the UV filters Benzophenone-3 and Octocrylene in cosmetic products due to endocrine-disrupting properties flagged by the Scientific Committee on Consumer Safety (SCCS). Those standards remain higher than those currently held by the US authorities.
Quit Smoking
Tobacco has negative effects on skin health. Inhaling tobacco smoke can reduce collagen production. As a result, your skin will start to lose its structure and may begin to sag. It will also become more vulnerable to cuts, scratches, and bruises.
Reduce Alcohol Consumption
Alcohol contains sugar, and partly for this reason, excessive drinking leads to aging skin. You can keep your skin looking younger by limiting your alcohol consumption.
Get More Sleep
Pay attention to your sleep patterns. It may be easier said than done, but sleeping more is essential for healthy skin. One of the primary functions of sleep is to give your body a chance to repair and regenerate at the cellular level.
Manage Stress
Chronic stress puts your body in a perpetual fight-or-flight mode which further inhibits your body’s ability to perform its repair functions.
You can supercharge these tips for skin rejuvenation with red light therapy.
Red Light Therapy for Skin Rejuvenation
Being gentle with your skin means not using any products that aggravate it. If you tend to have allergic reactions to skincare products, consider a light-based treatment instead.
You may have heard of red light therapy for skin rejuvenation.
Clinical trials have proven that red light therapy reduces fine lines and wrinkles, evens out pigmentation, smooths uneven complexion, and firms up sagging skin. The treatment is natural, non-invasive, no-touch, and doesn’t have any side effects other than a temporary reddening/tightening of the skin due to increased blood circulation.
How does red light therapy help your face look younger? The treatment stimulates your skin at the cellular level. The effects may be visible in as little as a few weeks, and you’ll continue to see improvement over time if you use it consistently.
Here’s how it works:
Red light therapy stimulates the mitochondria, which are tiny organelles inside cells that produce a cellular fuel called adenosine triphosphate (ATP). When something interferes with this process, skin cells will suffer from mitochondrial dysfunction.
The cells won’t function well and will be more prone to damage — and this manifests as skin aging. Fine lines and wrinkles, sagging and crepey skin, thin skin, slow-healing wounds, age spots, and uneven skin tone are ways that mitochondrial dysfunction shows up on the skin.
Red LED light therapy boosts cellular energy production in all skin cells including the fibroblasts. These are the cells that synthesize collagen and elastin. Red light therapy stimulates intradermal collagen density increase and evens out skin tone and texture. These are key elements of skin rejuvenation.
Red light therapy also stimulates the circulation of blood and lymph in the skin by promoting the formation of new capillaries. It reduces inflammation, which is one of the main causes of mitochondrial dysfunction.
This treatment an approach to maintaining healthy skin that addresses the root causes of aging skin, which is much more effective than any topical treatments that only address symptoms.
RLT may be especially suitable if you have sensitive skin, or if you’re struggling with a chronic skin condition along with aging skin. It is an effective at treatment for rosacea, psoriasis, eczema, acne and more.
Red Light Therapy with the BIOMAX Series
Smaller panel sizes are great for targeted applications while larger sizes are great for full-body treatments. The BIOMAX series LED light therapy devices come in four different sizes, and you can link up to four panels together to increase power and coverage.
Red light therapy has many more applications throughout your body beyond skin rejuvenation, so your best value is a light therapy panel. It can be used to help with weight loss, stimulate hair regrowth, soothe aching muscles, relieve low back pain, and increase exercise recovery time and more.
It is a holistic approach to skin rejuvenation that supports youthful looking skin at the cellular level. The BIOMAX Series panels also come with traces of blue light, for additional benefits for surface-level skin treatment.
Discover more in the Learning Center.