The saying, “You are what you eat,” couldn’t be more accurate in regards to your diet and the appearance and health of your skin. At ProMD Health in Baltimore, MD, we are big proponents of skin health and foods that support healthy skin, and we want our patients to take care of their skin on the inside so that all of their skincare treatments look that much better.
Overhauling your diet and consuming foods that support skin health can make all the difference in everything from how your Botox looks to how your skin looks after undergoing a facial. Once you do your part in the kitchen by helping your skin reach optimal skin health on the inside, we can do our part in our office and help make your skin look that much better from the outside.
You Are What You Eat: Vitamins That Support Healthy Skin
Vitamin D
When you think about Vitamin D, you may instantly think of the sun, and while the sun can help your body increase Vitamin D levels, spending excess time in the sun is counterintuitive to skin health.
It’s no secret that the sun is the number one cause of premature aging, and too much unprotected sun exposure can result in premature fine lines, wrinkles, sun spots, melasma, and other forms of hyperpigmentation. Ten to 15 minutes of daily sun exposure is ideal, but even that won’t get you enough Vitamin D. You need something more, and that’s where your diet comes in.
Why It’s So Great
Vitamin D is so beneficial to the skin because it is anti-inflammatory by nature, and it is a vitamin that can support healthy skin. Anything that is ant-inflammatory will help improve your skin, so if you struggle with acne, inflammation, or redness, increasing your Vitamin D levels can help calm your skin and keep it free of acne, redness, and breakouts.
It also helps support the immune system and keeps the skin healthy and protected from free radicals, which can lead to early signs of aging. It can keep your skin youthful and healthy and help lighten dark spots.
How to Get More of It
If you want to protect your skin from the sun but still want to get enough Vitamin D to support healthy skin, you can easily implement certain foods into your diet. Vitamin D is found in many different foods, including animal products like beef, liver, cheese, and egg yolks. Adding some fatty fish to your diet can also help fortify your body with Vitamin D, including salmon and tuna.
Whenever you’re in the mood for sushi, you can rest assured that your favorite spicy tuna or salmon roll is actually doing your skin a lot of favors. Certain foods have Vitamin D added to them to make them even more nutritious, including specific yogurts, breakfast cereals, and orange juice.
Going the Extra Mile
If you want to go the extra mile, you can take a vitamin D supplement each day to ensure you’re getting enough, and look for topical skincare products that contain Vitamin D so that you can be prepared on every level.
Vitamin E
Free radicals are everywhere, and you’re exposed to environmental toxins all of the time, even when you’re inside your home, no matter how zen you’ve made it. You also face these toxins walking down the sidewalk through the smog of a busy city. Your skin needs protection to ward off these free radicals and environmental toxins, and that’s where Vitamin E comes in and does its part to help support healthy skin.
Why It’s So Great
Vitamin E is anti-inflammatory and helps protect your skin from free radicals. It can also help improve skin elasticity, which is essential to keeping your skin supple and wrinkle-free. It can also help turn back the clock by reversing UV damage on the skin and keeping it as youthful as possible, the natural way.
How to Get More of It
While you can take vitamin E supplements to make sure your body is getting all that it needs, you can also make some diet changes to ensure that you’re getting vitamin E from the foods you eat. There are several different vitamin E-rich foods you can add to your diet. Sprinkling some sunflower seeds onto your salad or adding them to your protein shake will give you some extra vitamin E, as well as adding more broccoli and spinach to your diet.
Additionally, peanuts, hazelnuts, and almonds all contain this vitamin. You can add these nuts to your diet through nut butters or snacking on these nuts between meals to fortify your body and promote optimal skin health.
Going the Extra Mile
Not only can you support skin health by adding more Vitamin-E rich foods to your diet, but you can also find several professional-grade products that contain high doses of vitamin E. Daily use of topical Vitamin E combined with a healthy diet that contains vitamin E-rich foods will help your skin look and remain as healthy as possible.
Vitamin A
Your skin barrier is everything, and if you don’t have a strong one, your skin will suffer. Vitamin A can help protect and strengthen your skin barrier, which helps promote healthy, elastic skin. Eating foods rich in vitamin A combined with the use of topical vitamin A-rich products will give your skin that wow factor that can’t be beaten. Eating and applying vitamin A will help your skin look younger so that you look and feel younger in the process.
Why It’s So Great
Not only does vitamin A strengthen the skin’s barrier, but it helps protect the skin from environmental factors that can wreak havoc. This can help your skin fight off bacteria that can cause acne if it invades the skin barrier. It also helps protect your skin against the aging process, keeps harmful irritants from invading the skin, and helps promote cell and tissue turnover and repair.
How to Get More of It
Vitamin A-rich foods are all around you; you just need to identify them and add them to your next grocery order so that you can benefit from them. You’ll find high amounts of vitamin A in fatty fish like salmon, eggs, some dairy products like yogurt, fruits, and vegetables like carrots, squash, cantaloupe, spinach, and sweet potatoes. Adding just a few of these foods into your diet will go a long way in protecting your skin and helping promote skin health.
Going the Extra Mile
Foods that contain vitamin A are essential for skin health, but if you want to take your skin to the next level, you can add a topical product that contains vitamin A into your daily skincare routine. All retinol products contain vitamin A and are the closest you’ll get to the fountain of youth. These products help increase collagen production, smooth fine lines and wrinkles, increase cell turnover rates, correct sun damage, and lighten dark spots.
Vitamin K
Vitamin K is the not-so-well-known vitamin. You may not hear about it very often, but you need to incorporate it into your diet so that your skin can benefit from all that vitamin K has to offer. It has anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties that can support skin health. Adding more vitamin K-rich foods to your diet may help you reach your skin goals a little faster, especially when you combine it with all of the other vitamins that promote healthy skin.
Why It’s So Great
Vitamin K has been shown to help lighten under-eye circles. There’s nothing like waking up in the morning with dark circles under your eyes, but sometimes those dark circles last throughout the day, and nothing can lighten them. Studies have shown that vitamin K may help reduce pigmentation beneath the eyes and lighten those dark circles. If that isn’t a reason to eat more vitamin K-rich foods, nothing is.
How to Get More of It
Adding leafy green salads to your diet is an easy way to get more vitamin K. Vitamin K is found in spinach, collard greens, Swiss chard, parsley, kale, and all of your typical green leaf lettuces. It’s also found in broccoli, cabbage, brussels sprouts, and cauliflower. Eating more salads and subbing brown rice for cauliflower rice is an easy way to not only meet your fitness goals but help you reach your skin goals as well.
Going the Extra Mile
Since vitamin K is thought to reduce dark circles, eye creams and products that contain this vitamin can help increase the rate at which vitamin K works topically to reduce your dark circles. Investing in some of these products can help you look bright-eyed and fresh first thing in the morning and hopefully get rid of those dark circles for good.
When Your Diet and Skincare Routine Work Together
Once you incorporate all these vitamins into your diet and skincare routine, you will see some positive changes. Your skin will clear up, it’ll glow, and you’ll look and feel more youthful. However, there are some skin conditions that even the most nutritious diet cannot correct. Sometimes you need something more, and we can help.
Skincare Treatments
Wrinkles are often genetic. Even though your skin tone and texture may look beautiful, those deep lines and wrinkles remain. Whether you want to undergo an in-office skincare treatment to address those wrinkles or implement cosmetic injectables into your routine to temporarily smooth those wrinkles, we can help. From Hydrafacials to microneedling, we can help take your skincare to the next level so that you can achieve the most beautiful skin possible.
The best skincare routine incorporates a healthy diet that includes foods rich in vitamins that support skin health, as well as a healthy lifestyle and regular skincare treatments. In-office treatments can help increase collagen production, smooth wrinkles, and target and address skin conditions that need a little more attention. At our office, we offer many different facial treatments that can help work in conjunction with your healthy diet, including but not limited to:
- Microneedling
- Aesthetic lasers
- Facial rejuvenation
- Dermal fillers
- Skin Tyte
- PDO thread lift
- PRP therapy
- Botox and Dysport
- Skin coach services
Achieve Your Skin Goals
Once you begin to address your skin health from the inside, you’ll see some positive changes in your skin on the outside. Adding foods rich in vitamins A, D, E, and K can make a world of difference in the health of your skin. Adding topical products and in-office skincare treatments will take your skin to the next level. Contact us today at Pro MD Health in Baltimore, MD, to learn more about our skincare services and how we can help you along your skin journey.
