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Temperatures are soaring, sweat keeps pouring and skin is definitely not glowing!
Summers are here and so are the seasonal skin troubles – ranging from heat rashes to stubborn allergies.
But fret not, with little precaution you can keep all your summer skin conditions at bay. Here’s some of the most common skin problems that make their presence felt with the arrival of the summers:
Sunburn is perhaps the most common of the many summer skin problems. Stepping in the sun and spending time outside might leave you looking like a roasted potato, quite literally. Sun burns are brutal, irritable and often painful.
If you want to who’s behind the constantly itchy, flaky skin, you have your answer in prickly heat – just a fancy name for the more commonly known heat rash. It appears in the form of small, red rashes and can surface anywhere on the body. Common areas of affliction are the face, neck, chest and back, due to prolonged exposure to heat.
Heat rash is triggered by excessive sweating during hot summer months. Dermatologists say that excess sweat paves the way for dead skin and bacteria to block sweat glands, trapping sweat underneath the skin, leading to itchy and painful bumps.
Mild calamine lotions and aloe vera work well to soothe the affected areas.
Folliculitis is a common skin condition caused due to bacterial or fungal infection. It leads to skin inflammation causing red, itchy bumps to appear. The problem becomes exacerbated in summers because of increased sweating. A change of clothes after a sweaty gym session is an absolute must, so that sweat-drenched fabric doesn’t linger on the body.
Summers mean chub rub. Your thighs just can’t get enough of each other, meaning much love for them but trouble and embarrassment for you. The difficulty in wearing skirts...!
The culprit behind chafing is of course the humidity, which leads to friction, causing rashes on the inner thighs. “Staying hydrated is the key to prevent chaffing”, says Dr Surwade. She adds:
Talking about treatment, Dr Goyal says there are two ways to go about it. First, through symptomatic creams, and second, to actually find out the cause behind it because no two acne are the same. Hormone imbalance, dietary changes (such as not eating on time) and lifestyle patterns can all lead to acne. And in such cases, creams won’t work very effectively.
Staying hydrated is the key to glowing skin, not just during summers but otherwise too. In fact, with the mercury rising you have all the more reason to indulge in a variety of summer drinks.
Needless to say, you ought to shower once at least, if not twice and avoid allowing your skin to remain wet for long periods of time. Dr Isha Singh suggests using alcohol-free toner during summer months and going gentle on the skin.
Contrary to popular opinion, sunscreen is not the ‘be all and end all’ of summer skin cures. It is crucial, but should not be overdone. Dr Mankul Goyal, in fact, calls the entire trend a “financial gimmick”, adding that our skin needs half a teaspoon of sunscreen which provides only 20-30% of the required protection. He further says that using too much sunscreen can actually induce hormone-disrupting elements in the skin – sometimes leading to acne.
(With inputs from NDTV)
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Published: 24 Apr 2017,06:34 PM IST