What is uneven skin tone and pigmentation.. And how do I treat it?
Our aim from our videos and blog posts is to provide you with as much education as possible, to allow you to make the best possible choices with any facials or home skincare purchases. We want you to properly understand how your skin functions and make the best choices when it comes to selecting run your skin.
At our Poulton based salon, we currently have a lot of clients who are concerned about age spots, uneven skin tone and pigmentation.
Your skin cells create a brick wall formation. At the bottom, you have your Mother Cells which have the ability to duplicate and form new cells. All skin cells start at the bottom, move up through the layers of your skin and naturally shed.
Alongside the mother cells, we also have the Malanacite Cells these cells create Melanin, melanin is what gives our skin colour. At the end of each Malanacite Cell ‘finger’ is an MCR-1 receptor. When the MCR-1 receptor is stimulated the Malanacite Cell responds by producing more Melanin (colour).
UV rays have the ability to penetrate the layers of our skin and stimulate the MCR-1 receptor and begin an enzyme driven reaction to produce Melanin. The Melanin moves up through the ‘fingers’ of the Malanacite Cell and is then deposited into your skins cells. It sits almost as an umbrella over your skin cells DNA. UV rays have the ability to cause free radical damage to your skin cells DNA so Melanin ‘umbrella’ acts as a defence feature from future UV damage.
If UV rays damage the DNA of a Malanacite Cell it can cause the cell to behave erratically. If too much damage occurs to the Malanacite Cell it can be ‘killed off’ this is why you may notice white patches on a more mature skin; the Malanacite Cell is no longer actively functioning or producing Melanin.
Your MCR-1 receptor can be stimulated to produce Melanin by any of the following factors:
- UV rays
- Hormones
- Medications
- Pregnancy
Thus all of these listed factors have the ability to stimulate pigmentation; which make it one of the hardest skin concerns to effectively treat.
How does Vitamin A play a role in the effective treatment of pigmentation?
Vitamin A is the only way to restore optimal function to your Malanacite Cell. This is because Vitamin A is the only vitamin with the ability to repair your skin cell DNA. If we can repair cell DNA we can restore Malanacite Cell function.
Via the supplementation and topical use of Vitamin A, we can improve your skin tones appearance and give you healthier-looking skin. Fortunately, pigmentation does not have a negative impact on your skins integral health, it can, however, make your physical appearance seem older.
With topical Vitamin A use, there is always a chance of a retinol reaction. Reactions occur when your skin cells are already too damaged to absorb Vitamin A. So the Vitamin A surrounds the cell, this can irritate your skin cells and thus cause a retinol reaction.
To avoid retinol reactions we need to train your skin to absorb Vitamin A. We do this but starting off on a low level of topical Vitamin A and waiting for your skin to acclimatise to the Vitamin A before Stepping Up to a higher level of Vitamin A.
Once your skin becomes comfortable with Vitamin A levels we’re able to increases the levels of Vitamin A your skin is exposed to. The more Vitamin A we can encourage your skin cells to absorb, the more cell DNA can take place thus we can get your skin cells to function optimally.
