It's not just for skin cancer: Daily sunscreen usage improves youthful looks

For the longest time, dermatologists have been prodding their patients to apply more sunscreen when going outside especially if there will be prolonged sun exposure. The sun’s ultraviolet rays were pinpointed to be one of the primary causes of skin cancer, and sunscreens were developed to provide an effective means of prevention from this type of malignancy.

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Apart from this obvious upshot, dermatologists also claim that using these skin products can also deter aging. This piece of advice was used to be taken with a grain of salt, as there was no study to support it. Recently, however, Australian researchers have found scientific proof to verify these claims.

The study, recently published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, found that people who applied sunscreen everyday were 24 percent less prone to skin aging than those who only did it occasionally. Researchers studied 900 subjects under 55 years of age in a span of 4.5 years.

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Dr. Doris Day, a dermatologist currently based at New York’s Lenox Hill Hospital, notes the great amount of improvement which came with consistent sunscreen application. “Those who even had a good amount of sun damage had an improvement in the aging of the skin,” she said. “As dermatologists, we have been saying for years and years, use SPF every day all year round. I always say, if you don’t need a flashlight to see outside, you need protection.”

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