KaViSkin.com is a natural skin care solutions manufacturer
Title
Glycolic Acid and Salicylic Acid Peels, Sulfur Soap for Acne
Description
For over two millennia, people have been cleaning their skin with substances other than water. From the Bible, we know that tree bark ashes were used at one time. By the 13th Century, Italian soap makers began using animal fats and beech ash. By the 18th Century, ash was mostly replaced with another, much-stronger alkali, sodium carbonate. It seemed from the very onset that alkaline-based agents were to be an irreplaceable component of soap. To this day, most off-the-shelf soap is produced by some combination of an alkali and animal fat (usually harvested from the carcasses of sheep and cattle). It wasn’t until about 100 years ago that research in dermatology told us that the skin’s pH is in fact acidic. Normal, healthy skin maintains a pH of 5.5 as a means of protection against bacterial infection. This discovery created a paradox that is still very much in effect today, that cleanliness does not necessarily effect healthiness. In fact, it can be said that to clean your skin with ordinary soap is to make your skin unhealthy!
Dermatologists have been maintaining this paradox for decades. Long ago, when I was in high school, I developed a bad bout of eczema on my knuckles and elbows. At the doctor’s office, my dermatologist prescribed corticosteroids and told me to avoid washing my hands and elbows with soap for the next two weeks! He said that for some reason unknown to him soap irritated and inflamed eczema, often making it worse and counteracting the effects of the cortisone. For any other sufferers of eczema, I’m sure this is a familiar story. But the exacerbating effects of alkaline soaps and detergents are not limited to eczema.
Once the skin’s pH is neutralized by soap, the skin loses its preemptive protection against bacterial infection. In its natural state, the skin’s surface maintains a pH of 5.5. This pH is attributable to various acidic secretions, including perspiration, sebum (oil), and hormones. This naturally acidic environment on the skin’s surface makes for a very hostile place for bacterial growth. In fact, so long as the skin’s pH remains at 5.5, it is impossible for bacteria to flourish. And yet, despite the skin’s natural protection against bacterial growth, the most common source of bacterial inflammation on the skin, acne vulgaris, is being diagnosed on record numbers of patients. The problem is getting worse every year, and the culprit has been right under our noses: ordinary, household soap.
Contact
- KAVI Skin Solutions, Inc.
-
- San Francisco CA
- United States 94123
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- 415-839-5156
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