Health Tips

What Is Dry Skin?

Dry skin or medically known as Xerosis is a pretty common condition marked by itchiness, scaling and cracking.

Although it isn’t usually serious, it could be uncomfortable and unsightly.

While dry skin is not generalized by gender tendency, older individuals are more prone to suffer from dry skin, because they naturally have diminished amounts of skin oils and lubricants.

“Some people may have naturally dry skin, but even when you have oily skin, developing dry skin from time to time is highly possible.”

Extremely dry skin can be a warning sign of a skin problem called dermatitis, which means inflammation of the skin and usually needs intervention from a skin specialist (dermatologist).

What Are The Symptoms?

Signs and symptoms of dry skin depend on a number of things (eg. Your age, where you live etc) but the key symptom of dry skin is itching.

Typical skin areas affected include arms, hands, lower legs, abdomen, and areas of friction such as ankles and soles.

Dry skin is likely to cause one or more of the following:

• A feeling of skin tightness, especially after showering, bathing or swimming

• Skin that feels and looks rough

• Itching (pruritus)

• Slight to severe flaking, scaling or peeling

• Fine lines or cracks

• Gray, ashy skin

• Redness

• Deep cracks that may bleed

When dry skin cracks, germs can get in through the skin and cause an infection.

Take note that red, sore spots on the skin may be an early sign of an infection.

Who Gets Dry Skin and Why?

Basically, anyone can get dry skin. Our skin becomes dry when it loses too much water or oil. Potential causes of dry skin include:

• Age: As we age, our skin becomes thinner and drier. By our 40s, many people need to use a good moisturizer every day.

• Weather/ climate: Skin tends to be driest in winter when temperatures and humidity levels plummet. Living in a dry climate such as a desert also could attribute to dry skin.

• Hot baths and showers: Taking long, hot showers or baths can dry your skin. So can frequent swimming, particularly in heavily chlorinated pools.

• Harsh soaps and detergents: Formulated to remove oil, many of the popular and acclaimed soaps, detergents and shampoos typically strip moisture from your skin.

• Skin disease: People who had atopic dermatitis (also called eczema) as a child tend to have dry skin as adults. Psoriasis also causes very dry skin.

• Medication: Some medications such as high blood pressure, high cholesterol, allergy, and acne may cause dry skin on some people.

• Job: Nurses, hair stylists, and people in other occupations often immerse their skin in water throughout the day. This can cause the skin to become dry, raw, and cracked.

Are There Any Complications From Dry Skin?

While dry skin is usually harmless and treatable with simple home remedies, but when left uncared for, it may lead to worse conditions such as:

• Atopic dermatitis (eczema). Activation of the disease could be due to excessive dryness that is characterized by redness, cracking and inflammation.

• Infections. Dry skin may crack, allowing bacteria to enter, causing infections.

These complications are most likely to occur when your skin's normal protective barriers are severely compromised. For example, severely dry skin can cause deep cracks or fissures, which can open and bleed, providing a point of entry for invading bacteria.

Are There Some Lifestyle or Home Remedies You Can Do To Treat Dry Skin?

Yes, there are.

But before we get to the lifestyle nitty gritty, it's good to know that the best treatment for dry skin is definitely and undeniably applying your daily lubrication with an emollient, which is a substance that inhibits the evaporation of water.

Because most dry skin is due to external causes, external treatments like creams and lotions can be applied and effectively control the skin problem.

And you might be surprised that a few simple lifestyle changes can help relieve and manage dry skin, also preventing it from getting worse.

Some of the tips are:

• Avoid using hot water to bathe or shower. Hot water removes your natural skin oils more quickly. Warm water is best for bathing.

• Use a gentle cleanser. Harsh chemicals in certain types of soaps can strip oils from the skin. Stop using deodorant bars, antibacterial soaps, perfumed soaps, and skin care products containing alcohol, like hand sanitizers. Look for either a mild, fragrance-free soap or a soap substitute that moisturizes.

• Limit time in the bathtub or shower. Keeping your shower time less than 10 minutes is the best to add moisture to the skin. Anything more than that often leaves your skin less hydrated than before you started. Also pat, rather than rub, wet skin dry with a soft towel.

• Moisturize right after baths and showers. Lock in moisture by applying moisturizer while the skin is still damp from showering.

• Before you shave, soften skin. It is best to shave right after bathing when hairs are soft. To lessen the irritating effects of shaving your face or legs, use a shaving cream or gel.

• Change razor blades after 5 to 7 shaves. A dull blade bothers dry skin.

• Use a humidifier. Keep the air in your home moist with a humidifier.

• Apply cool cloths to itchy dry skin. Avoid itching or scrubbing dry skin patches, and instead, use cool clothes to soothe itchiness.

• Soothe chapped lips. At bedtime, apply a lip balm that contains petrolatum. Other names for this ingredient are petroleum jelly and mineral oil.

• Cover up outdoors in winter. In the cold, wear a scarf and gloves to help prevent chapped lips and hands.

• Be good to your face. If you have very dry skin, cleanse your face just once a day, at night. In the morning, rinse your face with cool water.

• Drink plenty of water. Drinking enough water (6-8 glasses) helps your body to hydrate well.

It’s also important to choose the right kind of moisturizer for your skin type. If your skin is extremely dry, look for a petrolatum-based product.

Top products for dry skin include mild cleansers and rich moisturizers. Non-scented, mild cleansers or soap-free products include Dove, Cetaphil, and Purpose soap. Thick, greasy, moisturizers include Aquaphor, Vaseline, Crisco, and SBR Lipocream.

Using a moisturizer frequently throughout the day helps many people. If this does not help, talk to a doctor or see your dermatologist today.

Download our Doc2Us app from Google Play Store or Apple Store and chat with a doctor today.

References:

1. Mayo Clinic. (2019). Dry skin - Symptoms and causes. [online] Available at: https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/dry-skin/symptoms-causes/syc-20353885.

2. Aad.org. (2019). Dry skin | American Academy of Dermatology. [online] Available at: https://www.aad.org/public/diseases/dry-sweaty-skin/dry-skin#treatment.

3. Gary W. Cole, F. (2019). Dry Skin Causes, Treatment, Remedies & How to Get Rid of It. [online] MedicineNet. Available at: https://www.medicinenet.com/dry_skin/article.htm#is_it_possible_to_prevent_dry_skin.

4. Healthline. (2019). What Causes Dry Skin and How to Treat It. [online] Available at: https://www.healthline.com/health/dry-skin#outlook.

Image credit:

1. www.Pexels.com

2. www.freepik.com

3. https://cdn.healevate.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/itchy-skin-big.jpg

4. https://www.abramsoncenter.org/media/1534/skin-careshutterstock_303875762.jpg

5. https://www.tungsten.co.ke/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/a-hot-shower.jpg

6. https://img.webmd.com/dtmcms/live/webmd/consumer_assets/site_images/articles/health_tools/eczema_overview_slideshow/princ_rm_photo_of_eczema_on_arm.jpg

7. https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/2380/5133/products/product-image-401337917.jpg?v=1508465579

8. https://www.melanieflower.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/Drinking-Water.jpg

Written By

Dr. Jeanrette J. Nierras

Reviewed By

Doc2us Medical Board