The thing about seeing doctors is that we tend to place a lot of trust in them to do what’s right for our skin. They didn’t go through medical school for 5 years and have the letters D.R. in front of their names for nothing, right? But the thing is, are they always right?
I recently saw a skin doctor who is by all accounts knowledgeable and informative and helpful. He also recommended me a brand of sunscreen that has raves all over and is quite possibly one of the better sunscreens out there in the market. He was even fine with my purchasing it elsewhere instead of from him – that’s how cool he was with it. I’ll tell you about it another day.
The active ingredient is Oxtinoxate 7.5% and Zinc Oxide 10.5% and sunscreen experts will tell you that that sort of sun protection is what you should be looking for. Zinc Oxide is a very stable mineral and an excellent physical blocker of UVA and UVB rays. The best touted sunscreens in the world use Zinc Oxide.
The snag is this : my skin hates zinc oxide. In low doses, I could probably tolerate it, but not in higher concentrations. I mentioned it and was told to just give it a try – it could just be the formula in previous products that didn’t agree with me, because zinc oxide isn’t a known irritant. Well, I did give it a try and as I suspected, I did end up with clogged pores and breakouts along the jawline and chin area. This is precisely what happened before this too.
Just last week, after a month or two of using the product, I decided to take things into my own hands. I stopped using the sunscreen altogether and went back to La Roche Posay Anthelios XL. Over 2 days, the worst of my breakouts started to heal. Areas I treated with my breakout busters skincare started to respond to treatment and I stopped getting new spots. By all accounts, my skin looked and felt much better.
I have tried a few products with Zinc Oxide and its never been pretty. I realize its an excellent UV blocker and it is in fact recommended for those with sensitive skin. Well, that’s great… if you can tolerate it. My skin just cannot. So I stick to formulations with Titanium Dioxide blockers.
And here’s the deal. I knew this. I knew my skin couldn’t take it although “everyone” and the medical profession knows that Zinc Oxide isn’t a skin irritant. But there is always that 1% that can’t tolerate it and that 1% just happens to be me.
So, no. I don’t think skin doctors are always right. They could excel at other aspects of treatment, and I would trust them implicitly to tell me what’s right for me or what I should or should not do. But when you think something doesn’t work for you, you have to be able to take things into your own hands and say enough. Because hey, its your skin! 🙂
Your say: Is your skin doctor always right? Do you have a similar sort of story to share?
Paris B
No, they are NOT always right. Not especially if they have vested interest in mind when promoting a product. Anyway, most of the products they promote are not their own formulations too.
I think they are knowledgeable about skin issues but when it comes to ingredients and how skin reacts to it, their recommendations can be taken into consideration but it’s best to know what suits you. I love zinc oxide but at the same time, it can be drying for some people and when that happens, cause skin issues. Glad that you decided to take things into your own hands and got your skin restored. I never like seeing doctors for this reason so even when I was battling my acne issue and everyone was like asking me to go and see them, I just refused. And I’m so glad I stood my stand.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts Sesame 🙂 I never went to skin doctors previously either and even then only saw one recently for certain purposes. I don’t think I’ll be continuing with whatever I have decided to undertake because I have also realised that I’m not quite as bugged about the condition of my skin as I originally thought LOL!
Mine has always been right (and he did help with my severe acne when I was younger), luckily enough. While most derm’s offices carry certain brands, mine has always been about prescription drugs and his own concoctions. Also he never pushes a certain brand or ingredient.
Good on ya! And I do think seeing a doctor for acne is a good idea. I never had that chance when I was battling acne and now have the scars to show for it!
I’ve been to derm after derm, and more often than not, they do work, but after a while, their medications just stop working. The current one i’m frequenting is based at the far end of Jln Imbi, and presceribed me a cream that even lightened my eczema scars!!! (psst: its good for facial pigmentation too).
I think I know that one. He’s extremely popular and I know of people who’ve gone to him with very good results. I saw him to help cure my contact dermatitis on my hands too and he was good at that. I hope he works for you!
My skin can’t tolerate chemical blockers like Octinoxate, Avobenzone, Oxybenzone, etc. I’d have to stick to zinc oxide, and even then its ability to suck the moisture out of the top layer of my skin leaves me pretty fussed about sunscreens! Anyway – your skin doctor is always right for general information, but when it comes to the specifics such as your own skin, you may be the exception and not the rule. It’s very bad bedside manner for doctors to discount patients’ description of what’s going on. YOU are the primary source of information after all.
Yes, I do find Zinc Oxide drying too and that might be why my skin cannot tolerate it? either way, I have realised that most doctors think you’re trying to be too clever when you tell then you can’t tolerate certain things, especially when its something known to be harmless. I guess they haven’t cottoned on that consumers are now getting smarter and doing their own research!
“So, no. I don’t think skin doctors are always right. They could excel at other aspects of treatment, and I would trust them implicitly to tell me what’s right for me or what I should or should not do.”
I think one should never implicitly trust everything a doctor says. I’ve been to a lot of doctors and many of them were not very good, in my opinion. Like you said, you were only able to have some foreknowledge of a likely problem with the product because you knew you would react and the doctor didn’t. Doctors don’t know everything, and oftentimes are not up to date with the latest research and findings.
That’s true – doctors can’t know everything 🙂 But I do tend to still trust doctors implicitly, because they have rather more in depth knowledge of medicals after all but perhaps, not in specific cases 🙂
Not just skin doctors. Any doctors for that matter even gynaes who’s supposed to help women give birth cannot be fully trusted. Trust your own instinct and understanding of how your body works, i’d always say.
You’re right about that! 2nd opinion when in doubt is always important.
NOT ALWAYS!!!! That’s why I always do my research even after any checkup! Sigh…for me doctors are just humans and they do make mistakes!
Yep, hence a 2nd opinion would be preferable. If it was medically related and I had doubts, I’d have a second opinion done. But since its just mostly skin issues, I’d prepared to let it slide especially since I’ve cured myself LOL!
omG…. i am still plagued with chin & jaw acne (sob.. sob) despite everyone telling me its digestive problem…Went for juice diets and clean food and yet, i still see those zits… Thank u for writing this, now to switch to another sunblock, to test if thats the culprit….
It could be any number of reasons – sometimes its related to dairy as well so cutting down dairy intake may help too. It could also be your sunblock or skincare. Tricky but you’d have to slowly weed out the possibilities. Good luck!
Noooo! Far from it. I think we can surely be the best judge of our skin. Unless the doctor actually performs allergy tests on our skin, he definitely doesn’t know best.
I guess it was just surprising to him because zinc oxide doesn’t bug anyone else. There’s little to no information about reactions online – I checked because I thought I was going nuts before LOL!
Very true.. no one’s perfect, and neither are dermatologists. Did your doctor know about your sensitivity/possible allergy to zinc oxide? I’m surprised they recommended a product with it considering your condition, even if it was just to ‘give it a try’. At least there are suitable alternatives for you to use, though. 😀
I did mention that my skin didn’t like Zinc Oxide but was told it may be the formulation of the previous products. Well, now I know it isn’t and its proven once again that I can’t tolerate zinc oxide! 😀 I’m glad I worked it out though 😀
I’d say it’s a delicate balance, and both have to be flexible in finding the correct solution or products that work on your skin. No point in insisting that one product will work for all when it gives you horrendous breakouts!
Thankfully I’ve been quite lucky in that department to have relatively “mainstream” skin that goes with the majority, so most products work on me to some extent. 🙂
I generally have elephant hide too when it comes to skincare but have also learnt that some ingredients can wreck havoc! So far its just zinc oxide so I guess I’m still relatively safe overall 🙂
Honestly, I don’t usually trust skin doctors at all. Here in Germany, they come up with strange and dangerous suggestions like curing acne through tanning beds (!!!!!) or not prescribing sunscreens when they put my brother on benzoyl peroxide. (Well, Europeans tend to not care about sun protection very much, and the only cosmetics counter I’ve ever been told to wear sunscreen, especially with harsh acne medications, was Kiehl’s. Of course, I wear a sunscreen anyway.)
When I was about 10, I had a rash on my whole body and the skin doctor we went to took a blood test (yikes!) because she thought it would be some really rare and really dangerous liver disease. (Of course. /irony) We went to our normal every day doctor to get something against the actual rash, who gave it a look and said, “looks like sun allergy to me”. Guess what it was?
So yeah, no more skin doctors for me. I’m educating myself to cure my skin woes myself.
It feels like most of them just experiment anyway, considering they most likely won’t end up killing you, and some I even suspect to give out medications they know won’t work just so you have to come back.
Oh my! They actually suggest tanning beds and not prescribe sunscreen? I thought sunscreen is now common knowledge worldwide. I can see why you are leery about skin doctors 🙂 I’m glad to know your allergy was not something as serious as liver disease. Some doctors really go all out to scare you and I would seek a 2nd opinion on something that major too!
Agree with you. I don’t like going to doctors. Prefer to remedy my own body by things like water, fruits, exercise, etc. And yes, on ingredients, I definitely think it’s personal, and each one knows better what each can take.
Just good to get a bit more factual knowledge from docs, but if it’s not a critical viral infection matter, then good to exercise autonomy.
I’m horrible about gong to doctors 😀 I don’t even go to doctors when I feel ill unless absolutely necessary. That’s how stubborn I am 😀
Any Dr. Is not always right! Caveat Emptor!
You’re right Jamilla!
I always have this cynicism when I am visiting an ophthalmologist or a dermatologist…the former one is always either selling me contacts or laser surgery and the later turned out to be a fraud for one, other was too high handed and then, I lose my belief in docs!!! I don’t think they are always right because it has become a business now a days and is not any longer a profession and you will hardly find two docs agreeing on the same product!!! I have been prescribed so many different sunscreens over the years by different docs so I now go by my own instinct.
I actually tend to agree. In both cases, its never a life threatening thing, mostly aesthetics, so it comes down to us and how we feel about things and how much we want to believe and what we want to do abotuu it. I prefer picking my own sunscreens and I think I could do without scare tactics in any form. Maybe doctors shouldn’t sell products at all – that’ll make them more impartial. But then they’ll be a lot poorer too 😛
nobody’s always right.
given that, it is still surprising many dermatologists don’t know what they are talking about.
Actually this was my 1st time seeing a skin doctor so I don’t have a lot of experience with them. I guess each doctor has their own views as with all professions 😀
I love zinc oxide. How about micronised 5% zinc oxide? Maybe that won’t clog your pores. Anyway, I guess you can mix titanium dioxide and another chemical blocker to achieve full broad spectrum coverage.
I’m tending to stay away from zinc oxide now. I prefer using a titanium dioxide + chemical blocker formula and thus far, those work fine for me 😀