Health And Fitness News 

Types Of Rosacea

Rosacea is a condition that affects more European and fair-skinned people than other groups. Flushing and redness of the skin characterize it. Rosacea can be clearly differentiated from acne because there are no comedones, and skin is usually dry, not oily.

But there are a whole range of symptoms associated with rosacea, and these symptoms have help specialists define it into subtypes. This is important, as treatments for each rosacea type are usually quite different.

EMedicine.com describe the subtypes as follows:

Erythematotelangiectatic Rosacea

People with this type of rosacea have flushing in the center of the face. They don't usually have oily skin, so they experience more rough, scaly patches on their face, without the papules and pustules. They often feel a burning or stinging in those areas, which feel worse when topical creams are used. Stress, especially emotional, alcohol, spicy food, hot weather, and exercise usually act as triggers.

Papulopustular rosacea

This is your typical rosacea - flushing in the center of the face, with small papules with tiny pustules on top of them. Blood vessels are likely to be enlarged permanently, which is responsible for the redness in the skin and mucous membranes.

Ocular rosacea

Rosacea can affect the eyes. Inflammation of the eyelids, and the meibomian glands, conjunctivitis, stinging eyes, problems with light (irritation), and watery or bloodshot eyes can occur. These symptoms can develop before any skin symptoms do, but they also can appear at the same time.  

Phymatous rosacea

With this type of rosacea, skin becomes very thick and irregular on the nose, chin, forehead, and either both ears or just one. The eyelids can also be affected by it. The nose itself can become either fibrous, glandular, fibroangiomatous or actinic (rough). This type of rosacea may need surgery, and is usually treated with isotretinoin.

Lifestyle And Acne

Your eating habits, sleeping habits and also the way we live our lives affect our health. Though stress is often a trigger in adult acne, factors like eating habits and lifestyle also contribute to the problem. Unless you maintain a healthy lifestyle, irrespective of the kind of work you do, the problem of acne is bound to continue. Stress, and our diet, affect our endocrine balance, and acne has a strong hormonal link.

One of the differences between acne medicine available by prescription, (or over the counter), and natural remedies, is the way these remedies often address the lifestyle imbalances we create in our body. Acne medicine tends to focus only on the symptoms - the inflammation and the pustules. Acne remedies often contain herbs that help detoxify the body, improve circulation, and clear the elimination pathways in the body. Many also contain vitamins designed to help skin heal better.

However, herbs and vitamins are not going to be as effective as they could if we don't also improve our diet, and find ways to deal with mental and emotional stress. Yoga, tai chi, and meditation, are excellent for this, although exercise is also good.

For some people, eliminating refined sugar helps to clear up their acne, even when they have suffered it all their life, and from a young age. This is probably because some acne sufferers have a problem with metabolizing sugar and refined carbohydrates properly. Their cells are not responsive to the hormone insulin, which brings sugar from the bloodstream into the cells. Thus, excess sugar (and refined carbohydrates) stay in their bloodstream, placing an additional burden on their body, and affecting the immune system.

Urine Therapy For Acne - Not For The Faint Hearted

If you're strong of stomach (or desperate!) you may be interested in reading up on urine therapy. Some acne sufferers swear by it. It's been used by them both topically, and by drinking it. Eew, I know :-)

Generally, the first morning's urine is used, and it is taken from midstream. The idea is that the waste is eliminated first, according to what I read in Nexus years ago. It has a rather unique taste, as you can imagine, so people often mix it in apple juice or something similar. Cold apple juice may take some of the warmth off fresh urine too. Warm urine would probably have a much stronger mental association with where it came from.

One woman wrote about applying it to her acne at night, though she did say her husband objected somewhat. Quite a number of people have reported success by applying it to their acne. I would think there are a lot of other things you can try first, but that is just personal choice. There are certainly a lot of other very effective natural acne remedies.

Wikipedia does report that urine is sterile, so is unlikely to cause harm.

Vitamin E Phosphate For Acne Sufferers

Vitamin E is commonly associated in healing scars in acne sufferers - and it does work. There are a few caveats though. Because it is an oil, if you use too much, or on areas of your skin not affected by scarring, it can clog pores and result in more breakouts. But many people have found it helped fade their acne scars, and it is very cheap compared to most skin care products.

But there's another benefit of vitamin E, and it has nothing to do with topical oils. New applications of technology have resulted in a natural form of vitamin e, vitamin e phosphate, being identified by one company.

There are a number of forms of vitamin e, both natural and synthetic forms. It shouldn't surprise anyone, but the natural forms are the most beneficial, and there have even been negative results associated with the synthetic form in some people. There was a study released a while back looking at vitamin e supplementation and heart disease, and the results weren't good - but they were actually using the synthetic form of vitamin E which has a very different molecular structure - and a very different effect in the body.

Fortunately, vitamin E phosphate is a natural form of vitamin e. It has been detected in the liver and adipose tissues in the body (that's the fat tissues). It's water soluble, and cannot be detected using the regular tests for vitamin E.

A number of trials with Vital ET, which uses the phosphate form of vitamin e, have found it to be an effective anti-inflammatory agent, and useful for acne and other inflammatory skin conditions such as razor rash. Whilst vitamin e phosphate is not yet widely available in skin care and supplement form, that will no doubt change as more research is done, and people find out how effective it is.