Now in autumn, when the air gets drier and it gets colder, many people with dry and sensitive skin start to "feel" their skin again. During the summer, the skin feels soft and nice, but with the arrival of autumn, the skin becomes drier and some people experience that the skin tightens and becomes more sensitive.
Skin sensitivity can have complex causes such as a thinner epidermis but also a change in the skin's sensitivity receptors. Several substances in skin care products can trigger a sensitivity, so the skin care you choose to use and how you use it can be an important component in avoiding reactions and achieving calm, soft and hydrated skin.
By treating dry and sensitive skin correctly, you can strengthen the skin's important barrier function that holds moisture in the skin, reduce water loss (TEWL) and get the important skin flora, i.e. the microbiome, to thrive and come into balance. In combination, this will result in skin that is stronger, smoother and healthier. Here are Skinome's founder, Dr. Johanna Gillbros, 4 best tips on how best to treat dry and sensitive skin.
1. Opt for a minimalist routine and avoid subjects that can irritate
To take care of dry and sensitive skin, you should avoid applying many different skin care products with a variety of ingredients to the skin. Many people with sensitive skin can react to common substances in skin care such as perfumes and preservatives. The more skin care products you use, the more of these less good substances you apply to your skin. Avoid substances such as alcohol, glycols, essential oils, sometimes also natural oils, and preservatives such as, for example, phenoxyethanol, ethylhexylglycerin, benzoic acid and potassium sorbate.
Maybe you need to review your skin care routine - and make it shorter? Healthy skin does not need lots of different creams, serums and cleansers. On the contrary, using too many skin care products can induce a sensitivity in the skin and long skin care routines can simply have the opposite effect on your skin – they can irritate instead of care.
So go through your skin care routine and think about which products you really need and which ingredients you should avoid in your skin care products.
The Skinome routine is simple and for you with dry and sensitive skin, we recommend the following:
- Apply your choice of moisturizer (Rich Intense, Rich Emulsion or Light Emulsion) in the morning.
- Feel free to clean your face, but only in the evening, with one of our cleansers (Mineral Cleanser or Sensitive Cleanser).
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Then you can combine and mix your moisturizer with our Probiotic Concentrate, which is specifically developed to care for and protect dry and sensitive skin, either in the morning or in the evening or both.
2. Cleanse the skin – but only in the evening!
The basic idea behind cleaning the skin is that it has accumulated particles from the city air, dirt, grease and other unhealthy substances, which need to be removed from the skin. This is important but today many people overclean their skin and scientific studies show that there is a link between too much cleaning and some of the most widespread skin problems such as dry and sensitive skin or even rosacea.
During the night, the skin forms unique moisture-binding substances that are part of the skin barrier and that contribute to soft and healthy skin. Surfactants that you find in many cleaning products tend to negatively affect the skin barrier because they can also dissolve the skin-specific oils that form in the skin. Therefore, an important piece of advice to avoid dry and sensitive skin is to only cleanse in the evening.
Skinome has two cleansers, Mineral Cleanser and Sensitive Cleanser, both of which clean gently but effectively and which have a moisturizing effect. They contain very mild surfactants, skin-friendly oils and also pre- and postbiotics.
3. Soften and moisturize with skin-like ingredients
So-called skin-like ingredients are substances that are naturally found in the skin and that the skin is therefore used to. These ingredients work with the skin and support the skin's natural function. After all, the skin has developed over more than 300,000 years and is a super-competent system that we should ideally disturb as little as possible. Skin-like moisture binders and emollients are undoubtedly the most important ingredients for dry and sensitive skin.
Emollients: Skin-like emollients are, for example, ceramides, squalane, lecithin and cholesterol. These are all found in the skin's own beneficial mixture of oils and water which, together with moisture-binding substances, are so important for healthy and strong skin.
Moisture binders: In order for the skin to retain moisture, we can help by adding ingredients that bind water in the skin. Glycerin, urea (urea) and PCA are also found naturally in the skin where it binds water in the top layer and moisturizes the skin.
When we develop Skinome's products, we place great emphasis on using skin-like ingredients such as the emollient and moisture-binding substances recommended above, which are suitable for dry and sensitive skin. In our new moisturizer Rich Intense, which has been developed to care for and build up sensitive and also dry to very dry skin, we also use the sugar erythritol which, together with urea and PCA, increases the skin's moisture content.
4. Feed your good bacteria
All the trillions of microorganisms that live on our skin and that make up the skin's microbiome help, among other things, to moisturize the skin and have an anti-inflammatory function. We know that a great diversity of bacteria is good for the skin and there are ways to increase diversity that also contribute to a balanced microbiome, which is of great importance for healthy and strong skin.
An imbalance in the microbiome has been linked to skin diseases such as acne, psoriasis, eczema and rosacea, but also to sensitive skin. The microbiome can become unbalanced through the use of skin care products that contain ingredients that can interfere, such as preservatives.
To correct the balance and enrich the microbiome, pre-pro or postbiotics can be used. Simply put, prebiotics are fibers that act as food for our good bacteria, probiotics are good, living bacteria and postbiotics are substances produced by the good bacteria. By using skin care that contains biotics, you can in the long run build up your skin, increase the diversity of good bacteria and make it less sensitive.
Many of Skinome's products contain either pre- or postbiotics. Recently , Probiotic Concentrate was also launched, which contains live lactic acid bacteria of the Lactobacillus reuteri variety. This product is developed to suit dry and sensitive skin.
Lactobacillus reuteri is the most well-studied probiotic bacterium in the world and has 224 clinical studies behind it and over 200 patents. Each bottle contains over 100 billion bacteria and in clinical studies we have been shown to increase the diversity of good bacteria on the skin and have a very positive effect on skin health.
