Skinpatient.com sun and suunburn info

Skinpatient.com

Skin conditions Patient support groups Product information

SUNBURN

Humans vary in the susceptibility to sun and depending on our skin we are divided into six types.

skin type	reaction to sun	types of people
1. Sensitive	Always burns never tans	Light pigmentation, red headed,freckled Celtic
2. Sensitive	Always burns minimally tans	Light pigmented, blue eyed, Germanicc
3. Normal	Burns moderately, tans gradually	Darker pigmentation
4. Normal	Burns slightly tans always	Darker pigmented Mediterranean
5. Insensitive	Rarely burns, tans profusely	Middle eastern, Latin American, light colored native Africans
6. Insensitive	Never burns deeply pigmented	Darkly pigmented native African

Sunburn refers to the redness, soreness and blister like changes that appear on exposed skin immediately after sun exposure. Sunburn is primarily due to certain rays in the sunlight called ultraviolet B though other parts of the spectrum can be responsible.

UVC is absorbed by the ozone layer as light enters our surface. Thus the importance of the ozone layer as if holes develop in this or thinning occurs UVC will enter more and it is more harmful and can cause skin cancers.

The amount of UVB that is received by the earth varies with the time of the day. At noontime as a direct penetration of ozone layer while early morning and late evenings the UVB levels are less. Note that reflected light is also important and light can be reflected off sand, water and even snow!

Treatment

Cool compresses
Topical steroids
Oral Aspirin
Severe cases – systemic steroids in low doses

TANNING

This represents a late exposure to sun exposure. The need to be tanned remains a great cosmetic desire of many. This has lead to increase in skin cancer particularly melanoma.

Tanning is due to UVB radiation with a little help from UVA.

Tanning is always damaging there is no such thing as safe tanning.

So keep your skins stay out of the sun and artificial sources of sunlight.