Hyaluronic Acid occurs naturally in the body, primarily in the skin, joints, and eyes. It performs a major role in lubricating joints and maintaining the healthy appearance of the skin. The body’s hyaluronic acid levels decrease with age, which can contribute to various age-related skin and joint problems.
Hyaluronic acid is also the active ingredient that forms the basis of just about all popular cosmetic injectable filler products, as well as in many supplements and topically-applied skin creams and lotions.
To learn why this is so, we’ll explore its various properties – you’ll see that this substance possesses a quite remarkable number of desirable properties.
Skin Hydrating
Keeping hydrated typically means drinking enough water to maintain your body’s correct level of fluids.
Hyaluronic acid’s most interesting property is its ability to retain water -amazingly a single gram of hyaluronic acid can bind up to six liters of water. Fortunately, it also has the ability to regulate the level of moisture inside cells, so that skin cells will retain the appropriate amount of water. This is key to keeping your skin looking (and feeling) healthy as you age.
Note that hydrating is not the same as moisturizing – although the two terms are sometimes used interchangeably, hydrating products are designed to increase the water content of the skin, while moisturizing products are designed to seal moisture into the skin by forming a protective barrier over its surface.
Hyaluronic acid is often combined with moisturizers to help boost the skin’s natural barrier to losing water, it also provides long-term benefits by continuing to draw in and retain water long after being applied.
Combats the Effects of Aging
As the natural levels of hyaluronic acid decline with age, the skin loses its elasticity and the skin’s overall vitality declines. When hyaluronic acid is applied to the skin, the level of moisture in the skin increases and the skin cells increase in size, which improves overall firmness of the skin. This helps to combat age-related loss of skin tone, improves skin texture, and can also compensate for loss of body fat beneath the skin.
Increasing the skin’s ability to retain moisture will also lessen the appearance of lines and wrinkles. Hyaluronic acid also promotes skin cell regeneration, and it reduces the visibility of age spots and uneven pigmentation. The overall effect is to give you a healthier-looking complexion.
Reduction in Clogged Pores
When your skin has the correct moisture balance, excess production of oil will be reduced, which in turn leads to fewer clogged pores.
Natural Product
As we mentioned hyaluronic acid occurs naturally in the body. As a natural product, it can generally be applied or injected without fear of allergic reactions. When used as injectables, hyaluronic acid products are often modified to create a thicker and more stable gel, which allows it to be used to fill in larger areas under the skin.
To cap off this impressive list, hyaluronic acid, when applied topically, is also used to treat burns, bed sores, skin ulcers, and help heal wounds. And if that’s not enough, apparently it can also be used to combat dry eyes, and research is underway to investigate using it to preserve joints and prevent bladder spasms.
We’d be happy to schedule a consultation to discuss the various ways you could use hyaluronic acid to improve your skin’s condition.
