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How the skin is moisturized, and what happens when you manically wash your hands with alcohol with COVID-19



A person hardly dissolves in water, because almost all are wrapped in waterproofing. This is the lipid layer of the skin, consisting, as the name implies, of fats. That is, on the one hand, we need moisturized skin, moist eyes, a moist nose and other organs, and on the other hand, our own isolation partially prevents the free flow of moisture back and forth.

Now we began to get friends who learned about the benefits of washing hands. And their skin dries from soap, disinfectants and other things. If you start to comply with the WHO rules, then different organs will dry up in you too. So let's talk a little about how this works.

If you pour tap water on your hand, then after a while the skin on it will be drier (this is especially noticeable in winter). At this moment, people sometimes think that some basic laws of the universe are being violated. In fact, due to the elements contained in the water (mainly calcium and chlorine), you break the lipid layer and remove from the skin another part of the substances that retained moisture. The result - your hands are clean. And dry.

If water could penetrate the skin, then a person would dissolve in the bath. In the sense, he does this on the third day (and can even take the form and size of a bath, which gives a certain joy to forensic experts and pathologists). But an ordinary living person is sufficiently water insoluble.

Why do you need moisture on the skin?


We are largely composed of water. This is a fairly universal exchange element, and in the skin it is needed almost everywhere. On the upper layer of the epidermis is less, in the dermis - more. You can greatly simplify and say that the moisture of the epidermis allows us to interact with the outside world and at the same time not to absorb very much.

Moisture enters the upper layers of the skin from the dermis, and into the dermis from the inside of the body. Therefore, if you systematically do not have enough water, the body will begin to "optimize the budget" first, and then turn off not the most critical systems. Simply put - if you drink only in the morning and in the evening, and endure on the work shift, then very soon you will begin to have problems with your skin and eyes. With a lack of moisture in the skin, it loses its protective properties. Very little moisture - irritation begins. It is often overdried - it quickly becomes covered with small wrinkles and visually quickly ages. Therefore, if you want to look good, first make sure that everything is in order with the water ration.

Drinking more water is a completely basic way to look your best at 40. That is, five to eight years younger.

How can you moisturize your skin outside if the circumstances are unfavorable?


To begin with, let's determine that favorable circumstances in terms of humidity are the lower canopy of the rainforest, the coast of the sea, or a forest of mid-latitudes in summer - spring -
autumn. Russian winter, an air-conditioned room, an ordinary high-rise building, a production workshop are unnatural conditions for us as a biological species. We suffer in them, and the body experiences the so-called “climatic stress”. Again, greatly simplifying, you are physically sadder because you are not in a comfortable environment. But do not rush to go to the rainforest: from there my patients often bring very interesting parasites in their eyes. If interested, we’ll continue with a series of horrors from colleagues last year with colleagues.

Normally, the skin is moisturized from the inside. Our body knows how to do this and if there is enough water, it releases it to support the skin. If suddenly we are in conditions under which the body was not evolutionarily prepared (that is, we live in the city, in fact), then sometimes external replenishment is needed to compensate for our inherent deficiencies.

As I said, your skin is designed to protect you from water. Lipid membranes are insoluble. It is useless to apply moisture to the top layer of the skin: it evaporates very quickly. It is necessary to somehow carry it inside, so that it is spent gradually.

Hand sanitizers dry the skin more actively than soap, because they have alcohol. Alcohol dissolves fats great, unlike water. And he takes water, too, great. If you drop an electronic device into the toilet, then in certain cases you should turn it off and immediately drop it in a bath with methyl alcohol - it will very effectively displace water. Yes, alcohol, it's liquid. But no, it is not “wet” in the traditional sense.

With the development of the coronavirus outbreak, the story of dezars — fans with a package of ultraviolet lamps inside — intensified. The basic design does not dry the air, but there are options for air purifiers and disinfectants that do not allow moisture to pass through (most often it is either about small filters and membranes, or about heating in the system). Just keep an eye on your hands. And the eye.

I remind you, if there is a slight sensation of sand in the eyes, this is a very very bad stage of dryness. Dryness is usually expressed simply in fatigue and is very difficult to track. If you want to wash more often than usual, you definitely need to do something, because washing will not solve the problem. Hands you very simply see for yourself. If your hands are dry - eyes, most likely, too. Although the eyes are additionally moistened with a tear and its components from the meibomian glands.

Two basic approaches to wet outside


The first way is to improve lipid membranes. Usually it is disturbances of these layers that cause dryness. For example, if you wash your hands with soap based on sodium lauryl sulfate (or any soap in general, but this effect will be more pronounced), then gently wash the sebum. Yes, by the way, soap does not disinfect. It binds with the help of surfactants pollution on the skin, takes molecules stuck in the sebum along with its upper layer and helps you gently lower them into the sewer. If suddenly “disinfectant” is written on your soap, and you are not working in the infectious diseases department, then your skin will most likely get worse.

So, the soap will remove part of the membrane, and evaporation will go more actively. The skin will dry. You can take some remedy and try to restore the membrane to them. Usually, people wash one fat with soap and immediately spread another, only from a can of cosmetics.

What to do?

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When my patient is seriously dehydrated, we can put a dropper with saline. Remember that a 20-minute dropper of saline solution works just like a half-liter bottle of mineral water. The difference is whether you are conscious or not. The rate of water getting into different tissues is about the same.

The second way to
take water and transport it through the lipid layer into the dermis. It sounds quite complicated, but we have excellent transport - medium-fraction and low-fraction salt of hyaluronic acid. These are large molecules that look like aircraft carriers, which load a lot of everything that can be hooked. Usually we include hyaluronic acid in our skin care products when we want to use it as a transport inside. Even in the bioreactor at the factory, we pack the necessary substances inside the molecules, and then the stable composition is stored in the bank until you buy and open it. In case you need to bring something complex inside you, a rather expensive medium or low molecular weight fraction is used, which immediately begins to penetrate through the lipid film.

For moisturizers (where you need to bring water inside), a large-molecular fraction is used. Why? Because it doesn’t immediately fall apart, but manages to create its own new film on the surface, tightening the skin a little. If you used our gel for regeneration on wound surfaces , you may have seen how quickly it closes the wound. By the way, this “Intensive Regeneration” gel nevertheless went into mass production by reference, became almost two times cheaper and is even sold on Ozone. This is a little happiness, yes.

So, a film of hyaluronic acid salt. Large molecules on top of the skin that prevent moisture from evaporating. Then the lower molecules of this film begin to break down and form smaller molecules that collect water (because there is a lot of water around it) and pass into the skin.

Simplifying, the high molecular weight fraction does not allow moisture to escape, and then gradually shoves the moisture inward. This is exactly how the means of our series “Moisturize” work, for example .

You can use other transport systems (liposomes), but this is already significantly more expensive for domestic use. You can use other coatings like chitosan and different gums for the skin, it already depends on how you feel better (it is better to consult a dermatologist with a penchant for cosmetology, and this is usually not even VHI).

A minute of tin


It is enough for an ordinary patient to drink water on time, and in winter and in dry places to use hand and face cream, hygienic lipstick and gel for the eyes. I’m talking about you sitting at the monitor - buy “Blefarogel 1” for 200 rubles (only 1, not 2!) And apply according to the instructions (just read the contraindications), but if you feel much better, you will have to see a doctor in a week. Because before this, centuries have been bad, and we need to figure out why.

If you are not lucky to work in an office where all measures are taken against COVID, then the air will most likely be drier than usual. Wash your face in the morning and evening, and protect your eyes and hands with different compounds. Just make sure that you do not have a vasoconstrictor in your hands (often sold in pharmacies for reddened eyes) and not an artificial tear (it does not solve the problem, but removes the symptom, while stimulation and purification of the ducts of the meibomian glands gives you the opportunity to improve the functioning of natural processes). For the skin, it is also better to choose something with the words "moisturizing" on the jar and the salts of hyaluronic acid in the composition.

As for my patients, they are usually far from being "unexplored." Eyes are the lesser of their problems. Often we are talking about a systemic infection or some serious chronic illness, a malfunction of several body systems, severe stress, or even a lack of consciousness in intensive care. That is, a frequent case in practice is when the electrolyte balance of the blood is already disturbed, and if there are not enough albumin or microelements of potassium, then the water leaves. First, just swelling, then the symptoms of dehydration.

For operations, we use a bunch of Vidisik and Blefarogel (in the eye on the cornea and forever, respectively). About once every few hours, you need to remove a stagnant tear (crusts) - we do it with a blepharosapkin. Now she has gone as an excellent way to clean the eye that lies in the bag of her parents, but initially we did it just for my and similar patients and conducted clinical trials later in our intensive care unit. In field operations (or in regions from a lack of funds), a cotton wool works with saline in the eyes, and chlorhexidine is used instead of a blepharophosphate to treat chlorhexidine (but this is directly punitive medicine by Moscow standards).

Our achievements in moisturizing (more precisely, another topic from the time of the polymer laboratory in the USSR, where the whole company came from) moved to cosmetics: for example, there is a whole line of moisturizers, but I personally love gel + most of all . If suddenly you are interested in more details, then here we have opened a channel with the chronicles of our laboratoryor @geltek_cosmetics on Telegram.

So let's summarize. Man is covered with waterproofing. It is best to drink a sufficient amount of fluid (at least two liters) every day if there are no contraindications from the kidneys or heart. Wash hands, face and eyes with mild products. Cover weak spots with gels. The priority is protective coatings with a gel texture (they are more expensive), then ordinary moisturizers. If you need even more water to recover, carry water through the lipid membranes inward using some kind of chemical transport. Do not wet your hands with water (especially salty or soapy water), wash dishes with a machine or gloves, and so on. Put a humidifier at home and make sure that the humidity is kept at least in the region of 40% (but not more than 60%, this is already a paradise for fungi). Reach the doctor on time (at the usual time), even if the question seems silly to you.And yes - when fleeing from a coronavirus, do not score on health and do not ignore other sores, but consult a doctor, at least remotely. And if you have any chronic disease - at least once a year, look at a trusted dermatologist and ophthalmologist. But yes, I know how much I ask. Especially in the last part.

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