«"Skin cycling": Does the trend of putting your skin on a diet really make sense?

“The method created by American dermatologist Whitney Bowe advocates for skin care in four-day cycles, but is it really advisable?”

The answer follows the same line of thought. From Dr. Javier Pérez Díez, aesthetic physician at Clínica Premium Marbella: “It makes sense from a general perspective, based on the premise that the skin, like any organ in the body, needs recovery time after being subjected to an aggressive external agent that produces a release of free radicals and inflammation. This rest period allows the skin to recover and restore its barrier, pH, lipids, and microbiome.” Therefore, as the specialist adds, “this cyclical treatment approach allows us to deliver a shock therapy with higher doses of exfoliants and retinoic acid, and then let the skin recover.”.

“"Those who advocate for this therapy believe that the effect on the skin is greater, since for daily use of these substances we should reduce the dose in non-tolerant skin,", Dr. Javier Pérez points out, She notes that with these types of potent active ingredients, "the skin generally undergoes an adaptive process and tolerates them better over the weeks." However, this means that in cases where these ingredients are better tolerated, spacing out their use so much can indeed slow down or diminish the effects of the treatment. "Applying retinol only two days a week is what we recommend at the beginning of its use, when the skin is retinizing or getting used to it.".

“The main drawback is the slowness in seeing effects. It is true that retinol or its variants can be irritating, but only at the beginning of use, so at first it is good to take a break for a few days, but then you have to progress and use it more frequently because otherwise, we will not be able to give the skin all the benefits we want,”, an idea with which Javier Pérez agrees, who points out that, in this way, the retinization process would be longer than necessary, never allowing us to increase the dose.