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FeedNot Your Mother's Cold Cream
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DR. MITCHEL GOLDMAN, medical director of La Jolla Spa MD, believes cosmeceuticals can turn the appearance clock back by about a decade—with a small caveat. “Usually cosmeceuticals will reverse sun damage by about 20 to 30 percent,” he says, “but more importantly, they will enhance the results of other procedures, such as intense pulse light photo-rejuvenation or any form of laser resurfacing. But then we also use the cosmeceuticals post-procedure for maintenance.”
If you’re in the market for procedures with follow-up cosmeceuticals, or just the products by themselves, Goldman’s facility has something for everyone.
The high-tech cosmeceutical featured at La Jolla Spa MD, which Goldman helped to develop, is called Cellustructure Rejuvenating Serum, or CRS. “Unlike some of the others, it does not smell bad, and it costs less,” he says. “It’s basically the strongest combination of antioxidants and botanical agents available.”
CRS is a topical cream that contains growth factors called TGF-beta(1), l-ascorbic acid and Cimicifuga racemosa extract (black cohosh). While the ingredients may not strike a chord with you, the studies may. One peer-reviewed, published study, coauthored by Goldman (Dermatology Surgery, May 2006), says it has shown the formula will stimulate collagen production.
Goldman reminds us, though, of advice we have always known but perhaps have not always followed: “You first have to recognize that the sun is basically the cause of aging, and sunscreen is still the single most important anti-aging ingredient.”
THE SO-CALLED “physician sellers” can get women “safely into their 50s,” says Dr. Brian J. Reagan, a plastic and reconstructive surgeon who carries various cosmeceuticals at his practice in the University Towne Centre area. “I did three years of basic science and wound-healing, so from a standpoint of what works on a cellular level, I’m more of a skeptic than most, but I do believe we have stronger agents out now that show promise,” says Reagan, who readily admits to using the products on his own face. “They’re a nice thing to use before you need surgery, when you first start to see signs of aging; they can delay surgery. And then we use the cosmeceuticals after surgery to protect the patient’s investment.”
Reagan believes the general health of the patient is important, and he sees smoking and too much sun as anathema. He ticks off the damage the sun and smoking can wreak on a person’s face: “Those little red vessels; the fine wrinkles; the pigmentation abnormalities; the bags under the eyes—they’re all caused externally.”
ONE OF THE NATION’S more visible proponents of anti-aging is Dr. Nicholas Perricone, a Connecticut-based dermatologist and author of five best-selling books. He preaches a three-tiered approach to gorgeous skin: healthy foods, nutritional supplements and cosmeceuticals. He says that “even with the most effective topical in the world,” you won’t benefit maximally unless you follow all three tiers. “When you’re really healthy, you’re attractive, and people are drawn to you,” he says, bringing to mind the pithy old adage “Beauty is as beauty does.”
Perricone’s well-known mantra is “lowgrade inflammation,” caused by free-radical damage at an invisible cellular level: It’s responsible for wrinkling; it’s responsible for aging. He believes the naturally occurring antioxidants and essential fatty acids in his prescribed diet—consisting of fresh fruits and vegetables and fatty fish, such as wild Alaskan salmon, his favorite— prevent the ever-present cellular degeneration that damages the skin.
“People have to be reminded,” Perricone says. “They’re getting a lot of promises from companies on the efficacy of cosmeceuticals, but at the end of the day, they already know they have to be eating right, exercising and getting enough sleep. There is no shortcut.”
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