May 19, 2025 • 24 mins
If your For You Page has turned into a skincare aisle, you need to hear this. This week on FIT(ish), Phoebe Parsons is joined by leading dermatologist Dr Davin Lim to spill the tea on the internet's most viral skincare trends.
From slugging and skin cycling to pimple patches and pore vacuums, Dr Lim gives his unfiltered take on what’s worth your money—and what might be wrecking your skin barrier.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Apolge production, Confessions of a train wreck, Dirty thirty and
surviving It sees its.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Big out of the way I live thirty is.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
A training for a characteren.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
No little Vamana in my dirty jeans, Berty in my
training for Orange.
Speaker 4 (00:36):
Commandment number two hundred and sixteen, that shall remember that
loving your skin isn't vanity, It's sanity. There are plenty
of TikTok friends I can shamefully say that I've jumped on.
I tried the healthy cocond out of balsomic vinegar, I
(00:58):
did lizards about downtime dance, and I even spent eighty
dollars on mouth tape from La.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
Do not even go there.
Speaker 4 (01:07):
But there are a few things that I haven't had
the guts to try yet, and it's mostly viral skincare. Now,
given the amount of shame I've already put my bank
account through because of this damn app, I turned to
dermatologist Dr Davin Limb to weighing on some of the
biggest viral skincare trends currently making the rounds. Well, welcome
(01:28):
to the podcast, Dr Davin, And this is a pretty
full circle moment, because, as it turns out, you were
my dermatologist when I was I think eighteen or nineteen,
and I was suffering with acne for the second time,
and I am addicted to TikTok and I was scrolling
on TikTok recently, and who should I stumble upon.
Speaker 3 (01:47):
On my for you page?
Speaker 4 (01:48):
But it was you when you were talking about Ola
skincare and it had had like a million views or something,
and I was like, that is my dermatologist. I need
to get him onto the podcast to talk about this.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
Oh really, I'm just too old for this shit, Like
I'm first generation like first generation dorm. Yeah. So when
people say TikTok, I'm like kind of embarrassed. Gig Seriously,
It's like, my daughter watches TikTok, so.
Speaker 3 (02:11):
Is she the reason why you got TikTok?
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Nah? I think one of the one of my one
of my team members in a QUB is basically say
when you go getting to TikTok, I'm like going, what's this?
And it's like, man, it's kind of embarrassing.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
But oh well it works.
Speaker 4 (02:27):
And speaking of TikTok, I'm a huge TikTok fan, So
I want to talk about some viral skincare trends, because
I think one of the scariest things about the reach
of social media is that a lot of people get
their information from unqualified people who they might stumble upon
on social media.
Speaker 3 (02:42):
And that's not just for skincare.
Speaker 4 (02:43):
That's in so many areas, like we see it in
nutrition and exercise, medical advice, and of course lately we've
been seeing a lot of skin advice, and I think
that skin and skin health seems to be quite trending
at the moment. And there is that trend that's kind
of like that clean girl asthetic because well that's what
it's called on TikTok, where people are really trying to
strip back and you know, kind of get the best
skin instead of piling on makeup. And there are so
(03:06):
many trends going around on TikTok, and before I try
them for myself, I wanted to get your professional opinion
on them, because I don't think they are all what
they've seen.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
Yep, So you're getting an advice from a dormatoldist and
now flip my doomatold hat on not a TikToker.
Speaker 4 (03:26):
Yeah, we're not here for the video views today. We're
here for the facts, the fact. So first one is
sunscreen contouring, and essentially contouring, as we all know, is
massive in makeup, and I've even seen people contouring with
fake ten, which I think is actually quite a smart
thing to do. But recently I've seen a lot of
(03:46):
people starting to contour with sunscreen. So essentially, if you're
not familiar with contouring, basically it would be someone putting
sunscreen I guess around an area, but then leaving two
patches on their cheeks sunscreen free or wearing like a
lighter shade of SPF I guess, so that they got
a natural contour from the sun, so it was still
there when they weren't wearing makeup.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
Oh well, I.
Speaker 5 (04:08):
Mean, first of all, you've got to be bloody without
it because you're you know, it's crazy because if you
get it wrong, just by a couple just imagine that
lying over the jagged line, I presume you also have like,
you know, spill lines rip when you sweat, You're just
going to have like sweat lines coming through it.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
So maybe from a logistical point of view, I think
it's just a pretty stupid idea. Yeah, because it's just
to me, it just doesn't make sense and SBF. If
you're going to use an SBA fifteen, then you might
have to contour using the SBA fifteen so that you
don't burn. I mean, so if you look at the
other way around, what happens if you do burn? You
have this red patch just below your cheekbone. Yeah from it? Yeah, pretty,
(04:46):
It's probably one of the silliest ideas I've heard. But
I mean I can see the logic because you want
you want the conto seriously, I mean, how hard is
it to do with makeup? Yeah? And yeah, and we
I mean I contour daily. Yeah, and we use dermal
phyllis to basically highlight the cheek, the chickbones to give
that really nice contour and a little bit of Halloween
(05:06):
just below the art. We call it the sub zygomatic hollowing.
That gives you a really nice contour. But to do that,
and that gives you a contour that you don't really
need to top up or worry about with sunscreen. But yeah,
sunscreen contour and it's a new one to me. Yeah,
I will give you this.
Speaker 4 (05:22):
I mean again, like you said, kudos to the people
who can do it, because that is just Lotistically it
sounds like a nightmare. But I do really also like
the idea of contouring with fake tan, and I think
that's obviously going to cause a lot less damage to
your skin than controuring with sunscreen.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
Yep, yep.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
The next one is gwasher.
Speaker 4 (05:44):
Now, every influence, I swear to God who does day
in the Life content seems to have added a gwasher
to their daily skincare routine. And I admittedly even have
a lot of friends who've spent like uputs of seventy
dollars buying quartz gras and you know, all these crystallized gas,
But do they actually do any thing? And what is
(06:05):
the point? Like from my perspective, it looks like it's
a nice self care thing to do, but is it
actually doing anything for your skin?
Speaker 2 (06:12):
So, from what I understand is that soft stone it's
like basically you're using a using either a stone rock
or an instrument basically just to rub on your face. Yeah, yeah,
it's like an instrumentation. So I guess there is some
merit with that. So it's called lymphatic drainage, right, And
lymphatic drainage is very very soft massage. It's very different
compared to getting in there and giving yourself a really good,
(06:35):
you know, really good rub to actually increase the blood flow,
so lymphatic drainage is nice soft. There is some element
of I guess accuracy with that, but only if you
suffer certain skin conditions for things like roseation. For example,
you have a lot of lymphatic build up and you
have a lot of fluid retention. You know, that may
have some merit merit, but if you have normal skin,
(06:56):
it's probably you probably best exfoliate, do something silly, to
do something, do something simple, not something silly, And so
you don't need to be really creative. So to be fair,
there is some element of I guess signed with gha,
but only if you have inflammatory conditions where there's lymphatic
(07:17):
lymphatic problems and you need to actually increastal inflow.
Speaker 4 (07:22):
And so then again this might be a silly question,
but I'm going to ask it anyway. So does that
then not matter if your is made of rose Courts
crystal or whether it's made of plastic.
Speaker 3 (07:32):
Is it going to do the same thing essentially.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
Exactly exactly, So you can use an old credit card
in and it's going to be the same as it
used the old credit card to do other things. But anyway,
but that's that's besides the point. But it's it's just
that slow lymphatic massage and that slow stimulation of opening
up lift lands and obviously using the court to the
(07:55):
you know, the Buddhist blessed court to jade or whatever
from Nepal. That adds some sexiness and some exclusivity to it,
but at the end of the day, it's just, you know,
it's just marketing.
Speaker 4 (08:06):
And I guess that's just what adds to the dollar
value of the guacha that you're buying in the first place.
It's like now crystal water bottles you can buy where
your water becomes infused with rose quarts, just.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
Strength from the tap, exactly exactly.
Speaker 4 (08:20):
Oh well, you've just saved me a good online purchase there,
so thank you very much for that honesty. The next
one is diy derma planing. So I think this one
comes in a couple of different levels, but essentially I've
seen a lot of people what they also call face shaving,
where they essentially shaved the peach fuzz and I guess
the first layer of skin off their face.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
Yeah. So, I mean this is a contentious one because
blokes do that every day is cool shaving. So one
of the things when you have. Interestingly, when you look
at guys, in males and females, there's a couple of
fundamental differences with the skin, right and maless, thicker dermis.
That's why it's very rare that you have males with
(09:04):
smokers line upper lip lines. Yeah. So there's various reasons
for that. The main primary reason is that we have
hair follic terminal hair fulicals and then they're like pylons
and actually, you know, give you support and hence the
skin is less crinkly, especially when you age. Right, that's
number one. The other the other theory, and it's a
distant theory. The other theory is that shaving, you know,
(09:27):
it's basically burm playing you're doing. It's basically like trimming
a lawn, you know, when you're when you're shaving off
the top fit of your lawn or hedge, it basically
stimulates new collagen production. Right, it's the same thing with
you with your with the skin, exactly same thing with grass.
So to answer your questions that there is merit to
that the but whether you do it safely or not,
(09:48):
that's a different question. Yeah, because for blokes, we do
that since we're what fourteen years old, fifteen years old
when we've got a couple of little whiskers here and there,
so we've got used to it for many years. But
you know, unless you have pcos and need to shave
every day, most chicks don't don't actually know how to shave.
(10:10):
I mean, it's just that natural. So my dermal therapist
they do it all day every day, right, they know
how to dermal plane and to do it safely. I've
tried it myself and the passion just to see. Look
how difficult is it. I think it's not a difficult
skill set to learn. So me, out of the blue,
just use a free blade and I can. I can
derm a plane without cutting a patient in ninety nine
(10:32):
percent of the time. It's not that difficult skill set.
There is some merit because when you remove the outer
layer of the skin to scrub and clanine the dead
skin cell, you increase the permittability of other substances and
that could be active. So instead of actually going up
with the concentration, you can actually derm a plane and
use your retinol and next thing you know, you've got
a much high concentration and retinoyl that bioavailable.
Speaker 3 (10:53):
Okay, so it's done in conjunction with your skin care, definitely, Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
Right, definitely, So you don't need to go aggressively with
it if you're going to increase your absorption of your
skin care. Certainly if you want better than not. Because
you're removing dead skin cells, you're stimulating collagen, you're reducing pigment.
You can go a little bit deeper. But still, when
I'm in deep, it's only the upper layers of the skin.
So done properly, it's a wow. But if you screw
(11:18):
it up, I mean, you know, it's not good.
Speaker 4 (11:20):
Yeah, you're going to have a little bit of toilet
paper on then what would happen? I know that traditionally
when you got like when you get germ and planning
done at a clinic or with a dermatologists, they use
one of those I guess sink like professional blades. What
would happen if I was just to shave my face
(11:40):
with my venus leg raiser? Would that be doing the
same thing or would that more so be removing the
hair off my face and.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
Removing the hair off your face? But once again, you
remove the hair off your face. There's it's contentious because
when you remove off your hair off your face, get
bitter thuminosity anyway, right, Because you've got less abdorption, you
get more of a balance rather than an absorption of light.
So that's the first thing. Secondly, I don't think if
you're going you're not going deep enough. That's why they
call it a safety razor, yeah, because you're not faining
(12:08):
deep enough to cause any trauma. So most of the
time I just use a fifteen blade, just a normal
blade or World Talk blade, and my my dermal therapist
and nurses do the same, so that's a free blade
rather than a safety blade. And you can do that
with a razor. I don't encouragation first drive with a
cut throat razor, but it can be done, and if
(12:29):
you're if you're tactile, you'll master it very easily. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (12:32):
Yeah, yeah, I wouldn't recommend it.
Speaker 4 (12:35):
I've done some damage to my knees and ankles in
my time, so I probably wouldn't be trying that on
my own face anytime soon.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
Yeah, especially after half a bottle of wine.
Speaker 3 (12:42):
Is something we all think it's a good idea to
try something exactly.
Speaker 2 (12:46):
Try something. Let's three blade, this is a razor my
face exactly.
Speaker 4 (12:53):
The next one I've seen absolutely blow up, especially in
the last few weeks is ice facials. And there's actually
a lot of tools now that people are either pushing
or selling. So there's like the ice roller that you
keep in the freezer and essentially, I know, you just
roll it on your face. And the next one is
almost like a it looks like a you can't you
(13:14):
can sive this, but the listeners can't. Almost like a
lip gloss. But if you freeze water in it and
it's ice and you roll it on your face when
it's frozen, does that do anything?
Speaker 3 (13:23):
What is that doing? What's the premise?
Speaker 2 (13:25):
Then? I guess first of all that there's benefits for ice.
I mean, for example, when we use dermal phillis botox,
I often use an icicle like an ice cube right
next to the point of injection, right because number one
alleviates pain distracts the patient. So when it comes to ice,
I use it day in, day out, post laser pre
laser pre injections. The other thing is, well, if you
(13:48):
suffer inflammatory skin conditions like for example, roisation, and you
want to cool your face down because one less rebound redness.
Ice can be useful, right, And the other thing as
well is that I'm sure you've heard physically when people
use ice baths after a after exercise because it recoups. Yeah,
but I think so ice there is merit. So I'm
(14:08):
not saying it's absolutely bs. There is merit, but used
in context as merit. But when you're doing ice spatials,
like I said before, you're better off exfoliating because I
think icepacials take a bloody long time. They probably fifah. Yeah,
So if you've got nothing else better to do, if
you're watching Netflix or what have you in your superboard,
if you want to use an icepacial, go for it.
(14:30):
It's not going to do you any harm unless secure
in one place in an icebern ice bern Yeah, so
genuinely speaker, it's not going to do anything. But if
you really want luminous skin and you want to do
it in like, you know, a twentieth time exfoliate, just
co exfoliate.
Speaker 4 (14:49):
Yeah, So in that instance, would you be better off
going old school and literally dunking your face in a
bowl full of ice cubes and cold water rather than
just rolling something slightly cold onto your face.
Speaker 2 (14:59):
You could do that, And I guess there's the merit
of shock therapy, do you actually, you know, shop yourselves
into into adapting in And it's much like your muscle.
Muscle cells recruit faster and regenerate in multiply, so I
guess there is some signs behind that. But when you
when you when you look at the effort for that
(15:19):
compare to mainstream things like you know, you know, your retinoles,
your skin care, your exfoliation, all that sort of stuff.
I guess if you got if you really want to
try prim for me, it's a harmless prem Yeah, it's
not like you're doing a harmful, harmful thing, So you know,
I think it's if you want to give it a go,
give it a go. Chances are you of it after
two or three days? Yeah, and then you've just got
(15:42):
the ice pros teasing out of Been there, done that,
and just move on exactly.
Speaker 4 (15:46):
I mean, I think half these things are essentially just
online clout and just things that people can buy and
then post them once on TikTok to say they've done it,
and then they move on with their life.
Speaker 3 (15:56):
Anyway.
Speaker 4 (15:58):
The next one is skin slugging. And I actually saw
a girl the other day slug her entire face with vassaline.
Is what, Like, I don't understand what that logic is
unless you have some kind of like I don't know,
really dry skin or something.
Speaker 2 (16:16):
Just yeah, so so one again. Yeah, it's like I'm
defending all these tiktoppers because I'm probably wonderful myself, but
there is some merit because when you talk about skin slugging,
so when we do it as dermatologies, we in w
slug all the time. Yeah, we slug all the time
in clinic in hospitals because what it does is it
(16:38):
reduces t EWL, which is trans epidermal water loss. And
when you do that, it increases the hydration of your skin.
So contrary to why people think that when you're putting
on the moisturized and moisturizing the skin, when you're using
a thick emulents and like vasalineo piccroliatin with something that's exclusive,
you decrease and water loss. And when you decrease water loss,
your epidermis or your upper part skins pack full of
(16:59):
water molecules and this is where the drug actually goes in.
So the answer your question is that, yes, there is
error to that. For example, if you want your threatnyl
to work harder, you chuck the retinal along you slug it,
and that way it basically works harder. If you have
if you have problems with skin, like what you say,
dry skin, whether you have eximostericis you know, crhosis, something
(17:21):
where you need more moisture. You can reduce the amount
of moisture loss by slugging. So contrary to what people think,
you know when you look at vasaline and piccoli and
blazed products and think, oh man, that's so big and inclusive,
it's going to cause acne, But a lot of these
are noncommunogenic, so they don't actually increase your your rate
of having acne. So if you have dry skin conditions,
(17:43):
if you want to slug, and I think a lot
of the terms we do slug ourselves when we use
Like today, I just before before getting on this podcast,
I just use some reton noise myself. So I use
a fourth generation retinolic desaratine, and straight after the show,
I do that because there's an increased amount of water
concentration my skin. Hence the retinoid will going deeper, and
(18:05):
I know in the next couple of days when I
do shed, I'll probably go to slug and when I
slug and when like QB intensive because that's going to
help me basically moisturize over night and then next day
I take it off, wash it off, shave and go
to work. So there's some merit in that. But if
you're doing it with calculation and doing it with intent,
(18:25):
I think it's a good thing. If you're doing it
because it's a bloody trend, you might be just wasting
your time. It's not going to it's not going to
do you any harm, apart from the fact that you've
probably going to wash your pillowcase, you know, a couple
of times a week it'll be.
Speaker 3 (18:39):
A bit stained.
Speaker 2 (18:39):
Yeah. Absolutely, Yeah.
Speaker 4 (18:41):
I guess that's a that's a mental thing trap your
head around to, especially if you ask someone who's had acne.
Like I remember when serums and face wells first came out,
I would not go near them because I was like,
I spent my whole life trying to get rid of
my oily skin.
Speaker 3 (18:53):
I'm not going near them. But now get them on me,
get them on me.
Speaker 4 (18:58):
One of the last ones is toothpaste on pimples, and
I have been doing this since I was a teenager,
and it's something I've always sworn by because it drives
those sluckers out so quickly. You put it on before
you go to bed, and you wake up the next day,
and I swear to God, you can just like flick
it off.
Speaker 3 (19:15):
It's so dry.
Speaker 4 (19:16):
And now I've seen a lot of people on TikTok
doing that, but I've heard it can be quite bad
for your skin.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
Yeah, it can be bad because I think it contains
certain by carbonate, right, and your skin slightly acidic, so
then that way you increase the alkalinity of your skin.
That's my understanding. I'm another dentist. I don't know the
formulation of toothpaste, but i'd probably presume that increases the PA,
which is bad. But having said that, you know, when
you're using benzyl products, I like to draw it off
(19:40):
as well. You venzyl products I can stain your skin.
Stain in bed sheets can cause irritation. So you know,
the way I look at things, there are stuff there
which is safe and for example, pimple patches, right, if
you've got a zip, you can use something a pimple
patch with salasilic acid for example. Right, the cheapest chips
(20:00):
nowadays Ago Chemists Warehouse combined for like seven eight bucks
in box that's got signs to it and changes out.
That's not going to screw up your skin. Yeah. And
the other thing is, well, toothpaste doesn't stop you picking, right,
but if you have a how to call addressing, it
probably stops you picking unless you're super mood the way
you can pick that off. But most people have the
(20:20):
haptic feedback and just go, oh shit, you know there's
there's a dressing over here. I'm not going to pick
it off.
Speaker 3 (20:25):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (20:26):
So I guess you know, when you look at what
are there better things? Yes, you know it's it's about
It's not me saying that that's the only way around it.
But there's safer things with more science, and they're probably
more effective as well.
Speaker 4 (20:40):
Yeah, and again I will vouch for that one being
quite a messy one because I toss and turn in
my sleep. So if I go to sleep with my
toothpaste pimple on this side, I'm going to wake up
and there's toothpaste all over the other side of my
face and my hands as well. Is there anything super
dangerous that you've seen yourself on TikTok or social media
around skin that just has shocked you, or anything in
your clinic, like anyone who's come in who's tried something
(21:03):
really dangerous.
Speaker 2 (21:04):
You know, Well, I'm just so I'm so desensitized this
stuff now. But that's because if you if you if
you watch ticked off YouTube, you know, shorts whatever in
consume Instagram, and if you're triggered by stuff, you're never
going to sleep right and you're always going to protest
and you're just going to go, well, you know, you're
not going to change you well that way. So I
(21:26):
think I've been desensitized. But there's so many things that
I see, things like you know d I Y T
c A peels for example, you know when they're using
crazy amount of concentrations and you know what, YouTube actually
doesn't van that, and it's it's to me, it's like
it's like battery acid in your face. Yeah, it's just
(21:48):
if it's uncontrolled. You know, some YouTuber can go this
is what I've tried, and this is how I'll show
you how to do it. So chemicals, chemical peals, plasma pins,
they're crazy, you know, when you use plasma pins, and
there's a lot of dry stuff like that as well,
when they're using platma pins and crazy shit like that.
So yeah, there's a lot of crazy stuff out there,
(22:10):
and as dorms, we see the aftermath of that, like
every week, you know, I'll see ady chemical peel that's
going wrong or do o y tasmapin or something that's
just going wrong.
Speaker 3 (22:20):
Oh my god.
Speaker 4 (22:21):
I even saw the other day when I was googling
viral TikTok trends that are dangerous, I saw that there's
a DIY like lip filler that people are doing where
they're injecting air into their lips.
Speaker 2 (22:31):
Yeah, yeah, at least, I mean, it still can cause
an air invalid but I guess it's better than having
a film or filler that includes are frigging ivory. But
we see that, We see that all the like all
the time, and I think if we get triggered where
where you know we have, we just do not sleep.
So for me, it's almost desensitization to social media because
we see day in day out in the clinic.
Speaker 4 (22:53):
Well, you again have been so insightful. As always, I
finish every episode the same way, and that is asking
you what your one piece of advice is that you
would like to leave all of the listeners with about
skin and viral trends.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
I think we've covered this. I think go cheap on
the stuff you're going to you're going to wash off,
really think twice about the stuff you're going to leave
on by the best that you can afford, and then
think carefully about what ingredients you're going to use. In
other words, use ingredients with a purpose, not just going
oh jeez, you know, someone on TikTok, including myself, is
(23:28):
promoting promoting, promoting.
Speaker 3 (23:31):
It, promoting yourself like that.
Speaker 2 (23:35):
Yeah, I think I think that. I think that's very important. Yeah,
it's just just just keep it simple, keep it focused,
spend money where it's needed and carefully.
Speaker 4 (23:45):
And my piece of advice, as someone who's spent far
too much money buying shit that I've seen on TikTok,
not even necessarily skin related, is just think twice before
you hit adakart, do you really need it? Or can
you go and get an ice cube from the freezer
and will it do the exact same thing exactly
Apolge production, Confessions of a train wreck, Dirty thirty and
surviving It sees its.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Big out of the way I live thirty is.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
A training for a characteren.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
No little Vamana in my dirty jeans, Berty in my
training for Orange.
Speaker 4 (00:36):
Commandment number two hundred and sixteen, that shall remember that
loving your skin isn't vanity, It's sanity. There are plenty
of TikTok friends I can shamefully say that I've jumped on.
I tried the healthy cocond out of balsomic vinegar, I
(00:58):
did lizards about downtime dance, and I even spent eighty
dollars on mouth tape from La.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
Do not even go there.
Speaker 4 (01:07):
But there are a few things that I haven't had
the guts to try yet, and it's mostly viral skincare. Now,
given the amount of shame I've already put my bank
account through because of this damn app, I turned to
dermatologist Dr Davin Limb to weighing on some of the
biggest viral skincare trends currently making the rounds. Well, welcome
(01:28):
to the podcast, Dr Davin, And this is a pretty
full circle moment, because, as it turns out, you were
my dermatologist when I was I think eighteen or nineteen,
and I was suffering with acne for the second time,
and I am addicted to TikTok and I was scrolling
on TikTok recently, and who should I stumble upon.
Speaker 3 (01:47):
On my for you page?
Speaker 4 (01:48):
But it was you when you were talking about Ola
skincare and it had had like a million views or something,
and I was like, that is my dermatologist. I need
to get him onto the podcast to talk about this.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
Oh really, I'm just too old for this shit, Like
I'm first generation like first generation dorm. Yeah. So when
people say TikTok, I'm like kind of embarrassed. Gig Seriously,
It's like, my daughter watches TikTok, so.
Speaker 3 (02:11):
Is she the reason why you got TikTok?
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Nah? I think one of the one of my one
of my team members in a QUB is basically say
when you go getting to TikTok, I'm like going, what's this?
And it's like, man, it's kind of embarrassing.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
But oh well it works.
Speaker 4 (02:27):
And speaking of TikTok, I'm a huge TikTok fan, So
I want to talk about some viral skincare trends, because
I think one of the scariest things about the reach
of social media is that a lot of people get
their information from unqualified people who they might stumble upon
on social media.
Speaker 3 (02:42):
And that's not just for skincare.
Speaker 4 (02:43):
That's in so many areas, like we see it in
nutrition and exercise, medical advice, and of course lately we've
been seeing a lot of skin advice, and I think
that skin and skin health seems to be quite trending
at the moment. And there is that trend that's kind
of like that clean girl asthetic because well that's what
it's called on TikTok, where people are really trying to
strip back and you know, kind of get the best
skin instead of piling on makeup. And there are so
(03:06):
many trends going around on TikTok, and before I try
them for myself, I wanted to get your professional opinion
on them, because I don't think they are all what
they've seen.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
Yep, So you're getting an advice from a dormatoldist and
now flip my doomatold hat on not a TikToker.
Speaker 4 (03:26):
Yeah, we're not here for the video views today. We're
here for the facts, the fact. So first one is
sunscreen contouring, and essentially contouring, as we all know, is
massive in makeup, and I've even seen people contouring with
fake ten, which I think is actually quite a smart
thing to do. But recently I've seen a lot of
(03:46):
people starting to contour with sunscreen. So essentially, if you're
not familiar with contouring, basically it would be someone putting
sunscreen I guess around an area, but then leaving two
patches on their cheeks sunscreen free or wearing like a
lighter shade of SPF I guess, so that they got
a natural contour from the sun, so it was still
there when they weren't wearing makeup.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
Oh well, I.
Speaker 5 (04:08):
Mean, first of all, you've got to be bloody without
it because you're you know, it's crazy because if you
get it wrong, just by a couple just imagine that
lying over the jagged line, I presume you also have like,
you know, spill lines rip when you sweat, You're just
going to have like sweat lines coming through it.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
So maybe from a logistical point of view, I think
it's just a pretty stupid idea. Yeah, because it's just
to me, it just doesn't make sense and SBF. If
you're going to use an SBA fifteen, then you might
have to contour using the SBA fifteen so that you
don't burn. I mean, so if you look at the
other way around, what happens if you do burn? You
have this red patch just below your cheekbone. Yeah from it? Yeah, pretty,
(04:46):
It's probably one of the silliest ideas I've heard. But
I mean I can see the logic because you want
you want the conto seriously, I mean, how hard is
it to do with makeup? Yeah? And yeah, and we
I mean I contour daily. Yeah, and we use dermal
phyllis to basically highlight the cheek, the chickbones to give
that really nice contour and a little bit of Halloween
(05:06):
just below the art. We call it the sub zygomatic hollowing.
That gives you a really nice contour. But to do that,
and that gives you a contour that you don't really
need to top up or worry about with sunscreen. But yeah,
sunscreen contour and it's a new one to me. Yeah,
I will give you this.
Speaker 4 (05:22):
I mean again, like you said, kudos to the people
who can do it, because that is just Lotistically it
sounds like a nightmare. But I do really also like
the idea of contouring with fake tan, and I think
that's obviously going to cause a lot less damage to
your skin than controuring with sunscreen.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
Yep, yep.
Speaker 3 (05:41):
The next one is gwasher.
Speaker 4 (05:44):
Now, every influence, I swear to God who does day
in the Life content seems to have added a gwasher
to their daily skincare routine. And I admittedly even have
a lot of friends who've spent like uputs of seventy
dollars buying quartz gras and you know, all these crystallized gas,
But do they actually do any thing? And what is
(06:05):
the point? Like from my perspective, it looks like it's
a nice self care thing to do, but is it
actually doing anything for your skin?
Speaker 2 (06:12):
So, from what I understand is that soft stone it's
like basically you're using a using either a stone rock
or an instrument basically just to rub on your face. Yeah, yeah,
it's like an instrumentation. So I guess there is some
merit with that. So it's called lymphatic drainage, right, And
lymphatic drainage is very very soft massage. It's very different
compared to getting in there and giving yourself a really good,
(06:35):
you know, really good rub to actually increase the blood flow,
so lymphatic drainage is nice soft. There is some element
of I guess accuracy with that, but only if you
suffer certain skin conditions for things like roseation. For example,
you have a lot of lymphatic build up and you
have a lot of fluid retention. You know, that may
have some merit merit, but if you have normal skin,
(06:56):
it's probably you probably best exfoliate, do something silly, to
do something, do something simple, not something silly, And so
you don't need to be really creative. So to be fair,
there is some element of I guess signed with gha,
but only if you have inflammatory conditions where there's lymphatic
(07:17):
lymphatic problems and you need to actually increastal inflow.
Speaker 4 (07:22):
And so then again this might be a silly question,
but I'm going to ask it anyway. So does that
then not matter if your is made of rose Courts
crystal or whether it's made of plastic.
Speaker 3 (07:32):
Is it going to do the same thing essentially.
Speaker 2 (07:34):
Exactly exactly, So you can use an old credit card
in and it's going to be the same as it
used the old credit card to do other things. But anyway,
but that's that's besides the point. But it's it's just
that slow lymphatic massage and that slow stimulation of opening
up lift lands and obviously using the court to the
(07:55):
you know, the Buddhist blessed court to jade or whatever
from Nepal. That adds some sexiness and some exclusivity to it,
but at the end of the day, it's just, you know,
it's just marketing.
Speaker 4 (08:06):
And I guess that's just what adds to the dollar
value of the guacha that you're buying in the first place.
It's like now crystal water bottles you can buy where
your water becomes infused with rose quarts, just.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
Strength from the tap, exactly exactly.
Speaker 4 (08:20):
Oh well, you've just saved me a good online purchase there,
so thank you very much for that honesty. The next
one is diy derma planing. So I think this one
comes in a couple of different levels, but essentially I've
seen a lot of people what they also call face shaving,
where they essentially shaved the peach fuzz and I guess
the first layer of skin off their face.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
Yeah. So, I mean this is a contentious one because
blokes do that every day is cool shaving. So one
of the things when you have. Interestingly, when you look
at guys, in males and females, there's a couple of
fundamental differences with the skin, right and maless, thicker dermis.
That's why it's very rare that you have males with
(09:04):
smokers line upper lip lines. Yeah. So there's various reasons
for that. The main primary reason is that we have
hair follic terminal hair fulicals and then they're like pylons
and actually, you know, give you support and hence the
skin is less crinkly, especially when you age. Right, that's
number one. The other the other theory, and it's a
distant theory. The other theory is that shaving, you know,
(09:27):
it's basically burm playing you're doing. It's basically like trimming
a lawn, you know, when you're when you're shaving off
the top fit of your lawn or hedge, it basically
stimulates new collagen production. Right, it's the same thing with
you with your with the skin, exactly same thing with grass.
So to answer your questions that there is merit to
that the but whether you do it safely or not,
(09:48):
that's a different question. Yeah, because for blokes, we do
that since we're what fourteen years old, fifteen years old
when we've got a couple of little whiskers here and there,
so we've got used to it for many years. But
you know, unless you have pcos and need to shave
every day, most chicks don't don't actually know how to shave.
(10:10):
I mean, it's just that natural. So my dermal therapist
they do it all day every day, right, they know
how to dermal plane and to do it safely. I've
tried it myself and the passion just to see. Look
how difficult is it. I think it's not a difficult
skill set to learn. So me, out of the blue,
just use a free blade and I can. I can
derm a plane without cutting a patient in ninety nine
(10:32):
percent of the time. It's not that difficult skill set.
There is some merit because when you remove the outer
layer of the skin to scrub and clanine the dead
skin cell, you increase the permittability of other substances and
that could be active. So instead of actually going up
with the concentration, you can actually derm a plane and
use your retinol and next thing you know, you've got
a much high concentration and retinoyl that bioavailable.
Speaker 3 (10:53):
Okay, so it's done in conjunction with your skin care, definitely, Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
Right, definitely, So you don't need to go aggressively with
it if you're going to increase your absorption of your
skin care. Certainly if you want better than not. Because
you're removing dead skin cells, you're stimulating collagen, you're reducing pigment.
You can go a little bit deeper. But still, when
I'm in deep, it's only the upper layers of the skin.
So done properly, it's a wow. But if you screw
(11:18):
it up, I mean, you know, it's not good.
Speaker 4 (11:20):
Yeah, you're going to have a little bit of toilet
paper on then what would happen? I know that traditionally
when you got like when you get germ and planning
done at a clinic or with a dermatologists, they use
one of those I guess sink like professional blades. What
would happen if I was just to shave my face
(11:40):
with my venus leg raiser? Would that be doing the
same thing or would that more so be removing the
hair off my face and.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
Removing the hair off your face? But once again, you
remove the hair off your face. There's it's contentious because
when you remove off your hair off your face, get
bitter thuminosity anyway, right, Because you've got less abdorption, you
get more of a balance rather than an absorption of light.
So that's the first thing. Secondly, I don't think if
you're going you're not going deep enough. That's why they
call it a safety razor, yeah, because you're not faining
(12:08):
deep enough to cause any trauma. So most of the
time I just use a fifteen blade, just a normal
blade or World Talk blade, and my my dermal therapist
and nurses do the same, so that's a free blade
rather than a safety blade. And you can do that
with a razor. I don't encouragation first drive with a
cut throat razor, but it can be done, and if
(12:29):
you're if you're tactile, you'll master it very easily. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (12:32):
Yeah, yeah, I wouldn't recommend it.
Speaker 4 (12:35):
I've done some damage to my knees and ankles in
my time, so I probably wouldn't be trying that on
my own face anytime soon.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
Yeah, especially after half a bottle of wine.
Speaker 3 (12:42):
Is something we all think it's a good idea to
try something exactly.
Speaker 2 (12:46):
Try something. Let's three blade, this is a razor my
face exactly.
Speaker 4 (12:53):
The next one I've seen absolutely blow up, especially in
the last few weeks is ice facials. And there's actually
a lot of tools now that people are either pushing
or selling. So there's like the ice roller that you
keep in the freezer and essentially, I know, you just
roll it on your face. And the next one is
almost like a it looks like a you can't you
(13:14):
can sive this, but the listeners can't. Almost like a
lip gloss. But if you freeze water in it and
it's ice and you roll it on your face when
it's frozen, does that do anything?
Speaker 3 (13:23):
What is that doing? What's the premise?
Speaker 2 (13:25):
Then? I guess first of all that there's benefits for ice.
I mean, for example, when we use dermal phillis botox,
I often use an icicle like an ice cube right
next to the point of injection, right because number one
alleviates pain distracts the patient. So when it comes to ice,
I use it day in, day out, post laser pre
laser pre injections. The other thing is, well, if you
(13:48):
suffer inflammatory skin conditions like for example, roisation, and you
want to cool your face down because one less rebound redness.
Ice can be useful, right, And the other thing as
well is that I'm sure you've heard physically when people
use ice baths after a after exercise because it recoups. Yeah,
but I think so ice there is merit. So I'm
(14:08):
not saying it's absolutely bs. There is merit, but used
in context as merit. But when you're doing ice spatials,
like I said before, you're better off exfoliating because I
think icepacials take a bloody long time. They probably fifah. Yeah,
So if you've got nothing else better to do, if
you're watching Netflix or what have you in your superboard,
if you want to use an icepacial, go for it.
(14:30):
It's not going to do you any harm unless secure
in one place in an icebern ice bern Yeah, so
genuinely speaker, it's not going to do anything. But if
you really want luminous skin and you want to do
it in like, you know, a twentieth time exfoliate, just
co exfoliate.
Speaker 4 (14:49):
Yeah, So in that instance, would you be better off
going old school and literally dunking your face in a
bowl full of ice cubes and cold water rather than
just rolling something slightly cold onto your face.
Speaker 2 (14:59):
You could do that, And I guess there's the merit
of shock therapy, do you actually, you know, shop yourselves
into into adapting in And it's much like your muscle.
Muscle cells recruit faster and regenerate in multiply, so I
guess there is some signs behind that. But when you
when you when you look at the effort for that
(15:19):
compare to mainstream things like you know, you know, your retinoles,
your skin care, your exfoliation, all that sort of stuff.
I guess if you got if you really want to
try prim for me, it's a harmless prem Yeah, it's
not like you're doing a harmful, harmful thing, So you know,
I think it's if you want to give it a go,
give it a go. Chances are you of it after
two or three days? Yeah, and then you've just got
(15:42):
the ice pros teasing out of Been there, done that,
and just move on exactly.
Speaker 4 (15:46):
I mean, I think half these things are essentially just
online clout and just things that people can buy and
then post them once on TikTok to say they've done it,
and then they move on with their life.
Speaker 3 (15:56):
Anyway.
Speaker 4 (15:58):
The next one is skin slugging. And I actually saw
a girl the other day slug her entire face with vassaline.
Is what, Like, I don't understand what that logic is
unless you have some kind of like I don't know,
really dry skin or something.
Speaker 2 (16:16):
Just yeah, so so one again. Yeah, it's like I'm
defending all these tiktoppers because I'm probably wonderful myself, but
there is some merit because when you talk about skin slugging,
so when we do it as dermatologies, we in w
slug all the time. Yeah, we slug all the time
in clinic in hospitals because what it does is it
(16:38):
reduces t EWL, which is trans epidermal water loss. And
when you do that, it increases the hydration of your skin.
So contrary to why people think that when you're putting
on the moisturized and moisturizing the skin, when you're using
a thick emulents and like vasalineo piccroliatin with something that's exclusive,
you decrease and water loss. And when you decrease water loss,
your epidermis or your upper part skins pack full of
(16:59):
water molecules and this is where the drug actually goes in.
So the answer your question is that, yes, there is
error to that. For example, if you want your threatnyl
to work harder, you chuck the retinal along you slug it,
and that way it basically works harder. If you have
if you have problems with skin, like what you say,
dry skin, whether you have eximostericis you know, crhosis, something
(17:21):
where you need more moisture. You can reduce the amount
of moisture loss by slugging. So contrary to what people think,
you know when you look at vasaline and piccoli and
blazed products and think, oh man, that's so big and inclusive,
it's going to cause acne, But a lot of these
are noncommunogenic, so they don't actually increase your your rate
of having acne. So if you have dry skin conditions,
(17:43):
if you want to slug, and I think a lot
of the terms we do slug ourselves when we use
Like today, I just before before getting on this podcast,
I just use some reton noise myself. So I use
a fourth generation retinolic desaratine, and straight after the show,
I do that because there's an increased amount of water
concentration my skin. Hence the retinoid will going deeper, and
(18:05):
I know in the next couple of days when I
do shed, I'll probably go to slug and when I
slug and when like QB intensive because that's going to
help me basically moisturize over night and then next day
I take it off, wash it off, shave and go
to work. So there's some merit in that. But if
you're doing it with calculation and doing it with intent,
(18:25):
I think it's a good thing. If you're doing it
because it's a bloody trend, you might be just wasting
your time. It's not going to it's not going to
do you any harm, apart from the fact that you've
probably going to wash your pillowcase, you know, a couple
of times a week it'll be.
Speaker 3 (18:39):
A bit stained.
Speaker 2 (18:39):
Yeah. Absolutely, Yeah.
Speaker 4 (18:41):
I guess that's a that's a mental thing trap your
head around to, especially if you ask someone who's had acne.
Like I remember when serums and face wells first came out,
I would not go near them because I was like,
I spent my whole life trying to get rid of
my oily skin.
Speaker 3 (18:53):
I'm not going near them. But now get them on me,
get them on me.
Speaker 4 (18:58):
One of the last ones is toothpaste on pimples, and
I have been doing this since I was a teenager,
and it's something I've always sworn by because it drives
those sluckers out so quickly. You put it on before
you go to bed, and you wake up the next day,
and I swear to God, you can just like flick
it off.
Speaker 3 (19:15):
It's so dry.
Speaker 4 (19:16):
And now I've seen a lot of people on TikTok
doing that, but I've heard it can be quite bad
for your skin.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
Yeah, it can be bad because I think it contains
certain by carbonate, right, and your skin slightly acidic, so
then that way you increase the alkalinity of your skin.
That's my understanding. I'm another dentist. I don't know the
formulation of toothpaste, but i'd probably presume that increases the PA,
which is bad. But having said that, you know, when
you're using benzyl products, I like to draw it off
(19:40):
as well. You venzyl products I can stain your skin.
Stain in bed sheets can cause irritation. So you know,
the way I look at things, there are stuff there
which is safe and for example, pimple patches, right, if
you've got a zip, you can use something a pimple
patch with salasilic acid for example. Right, the cheapest chips
(20:00):
nowadays Ago Chemists Warehouse combined for like seven eight bucks
in box that's got signs to it and changes out.
That's not going to screw up your skin. Yeah. And
the other thing is, well, toothpaste doesn't stop you picking, right,
but if you have a how to call addressing, it
probably stops you picking unless you're super mood the way
you can pick that off. But most people have the
(20:20):
haptic feedback and just go, oh shit, you know there's
there's a dressing over here. I'm not going to pick
it off.
Speaker 3 (20:25):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (20:26):
So I guess you know, when you look at what
are there better things? Yes, you know it's it's about
It's not me saying that that's the only way around it.
But there's safer things with more science, and they're probably
more effective as well.
Speaker 4 (20:40):
Yeah, and again I will vouch for that one being
quite a messy one because I toss and turn in
my sleep. So if I go to sleep with my
toothpaste pimple on this side, I'm going to wake up
and there's toothpaste all over the other side of my
face and my hands as well. Is there anything super
dangerous that you've seen yourself on TikTok or social media
around skin that just has shocked you, or anything in
your clinic, like anyone who's come in who's tried something
(21:03):
really dangerous.
Speaker 2 (21:04):
You know, Well, I'm just so I'm so desensitized this
stuff now. But that's because if you if you if
you watch ticked off YouTube, you know, shorts whatever in
consume Instagram, and if you're triggered by stuff, you're never
going to sleep right and you're always going to protest
and you're just going to go, well, you know, you're
not going to change you well that way. So I
(21:26):
think I've been desensitized. But there's so many things that
I see, things like you know d I Y T
c A peels for example, you know when they're using
crazy amount of concentrations and you know what, YouTube actually
doesn't van that, and it's it's to me, it's like
it's like battery acid in your face. Yeah, it's just
(21:48):
if it's uncontrolled. You know, some YouTuber can go this
is what I've tried, and this is how I'll show
you how to do it. So chemicals, chemical peals, plasma pins,
they're crazy, you know, when you use plasma pins, and
there's a lot of dry stuff like that as well,
when they're using platma pins and crazy shit like that.
So yeah, there's a lot of crazy stuff out there,
(22:10):
and as dorms, we see the aftermath of that, like
every week, you know, I'll see ady chemical peel that's
going wrong or do o y tasmapin or something that's
just going wrong.
Speaker 3 (22:20):
Oh my god.
Speaker 4 (22:21):
I even saw the other day when I was googling
viral TikTok trends that are dangerous, I saw that there's
a DIY like lip filler that people are doing where
they're injecting air into their lips.
Speaker 2 (22:31):
Yeah, yeah, at least, I mean, it still can cause
an air invalid but I guess it's better than having
a film or filler that includes are frigging ivory. But
we see that, We see that all the like all
the time, and I think if we get triggered where
where you know we have, we just do not sleep.
So for me, it's almost desensitization to social media because
we see day in day out in the clinic.
Speaker 4 (22:53):
Well, you again have been so insightful. As always, I
finish every episode the same way, and that is asking
you what your one piece of advice is that you
would like to leave all of the listeners with about
skin and viral trends.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
I think we've covered this. I think go cheap on
the stuff you're going to you're going to wash off,
really think twice about the stuff you're going to leave
on by the best that you can afford, and then
think carefully about what ingredients you're going to use. In
other words, use ingredients with a purpose, not just going
oh jeez, you know, someone on TikTok, including myself, is
(23:28):
promoting promoting, promoting.
Speaker 3 (23:31):
It, promoting yourself like that.
Speaker 2 (23:35):
Yeah, I think I think that. I think that's very important. Yeah,
it's just just just keep it simple, keep it focused,
spend money where it's needed and carefully.
Speaker 4 (23:45):
And my piece of advice, as someone who's spent far
too much money buying shit that I've seen on TikTok,
not even necessarily skin related, is just think twice before
you hit adakart, do you really need it? Or can
you go and get an ice cube from the freezer
and will it do the exact same thing exactly
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