How long it takes to see results from your retinoid. Dermatologist @Dr Dray on how long it takes to see results from retinoids. How long does it take to see results from retinoid? How long does it take for hyperpigmentation to fade? The time it takes to see results from a retinoid for wrinkles, hyperpigmentation, smoother skin, and acne varies from person to person. In this video we discuss how long the retinoid uglies last and how long purging lasts from retinoid. #antiaging #retinol #dermatologist
Well hey guys in this video i’m going to be going over what you can expect when starting a retinoid when exactly are you going to start seeing results you know it doesn’t happen overnight it can take some time but in this video i’m going to go over when you can expect to see certain results and hopefully that helps encourage you to stick with it and not give up
Just because you’re not seeing any change if you’re new here welcome my name is andrea i’m a board certified dermatologist and if you like skincare content consider subscribing to my youtube channel or following me over on tiktok or instagram as i post a fair amount of skincare content on those platforms as well as far as topical retinoids they’re a big family
Of ingredients you’ve got the prescription retinoids like tretinoin and the over-the-counter fda approved retinoid adaptolene and then you have the cosmeceutical cosmetic ingredients retinol and retinaldehyde in this video i’m specifically going to be talking about prescription retinoids or over-the-counter adaptiline as far as results and the reason for that
Is that when it comes to retinol and retinaldehyde we just don’t have as good of research to predict the timeline for those but anything that i’m going to be giving you in this video as far as expectations just know that with retinol or retinaldehyde it may take a little bit longer if you’ve ever stumbled on a video or paper talking about retinoids chances are
You’ve heard of the retinoid ugly what the heck is that and how long does it last all right when you first start a topical retinoid it can cause a lot of irritation dryness peeling some people find that their skin is very sensitive they have redness that lasts typically a few weeks ways around this process are to be very gentle with your skincare routine make sure
You’re using a gentle cleanser to remove cosmetics dirt sunscreen film and just avoid any other types of skincare pro products while you’re going through this process other than sunscreen cleanser and moisturizer and in the description box i will list some of my favorites that are great options for starting a retinoid best to just keep your routine as boring as
Possible because your skin may likely be a lot more sensitive during this period of time if you are using a retinoid for the treatment of acne you might notice in the first few weeks that your acne actually gets worse and this actually terrifies people hearing that this might occur but there’s no reason to be afraid it happens to some people but not to everyone
It’s commonly referred to as purging and what this process is is basically any acne that you have under the skin kind of comes out more so all at once it appears in areas where you typically get acne and it resolves much faster i have a video explaining the differences between purging skin irritation and breakouts i will link that down below in the description
Box you can learn a little bit more about this but it happens in some people not in everyone and this typically lasts at most six weeks anything beyond that is not purging it’s more likely irritation so you can expect it’s not going to continue beyond six weeks i do get questions from time to time hey i’m going to switch to a higher percentage of a retinoid am i
Going to go through the purging process again you really shouldn’t purging the dryness the irritation all that it really shouldn’t happen so long as you have remained consistent with using the retinoid if you then switch to a higher percentage it’s not likely to happen dryness irritation purging these things may be a little bit more likely with higher percentage
Strengths than lower but to reiterate if you’re going from a lower percentage strength to a higher purging and irritation should not reoccur it should be something that is your skin has already kind of gotten accustomed to dryness irritation peeling purging redness tends to be a little bit more common with tretinoin especially at higher percentages and a little bit
More common with tazeratine it’s less common and less of an issue although it still occurs with adaptiline and dappling tends to be a lot gentler pharmaceutical companies have really tried to modify these retinoids and their vehicles meaning the inactive stuff in such a way to make the retinoids a lot more tolerable and make this process less of an issue there is
Retin-a micro which is much less irritating for many people there’s altrina lotion which is a lot less irritating for many people there’s a newer retinoid called triferitine which is again by prescription only it’s a brand name ackley if i have a video on it by that way now if you have a lot of sun damage to start with the peeling the dryness the irritation tends
To be a little bit more robust than in somebody who does not so when can you start expecting the good stuff well one of the benefits of using a topical retinoid consistently is smoother skin and you can start to appreciate that around four to six weeks after using it consistently so hopefully the purging the irritation is over and you may notice when you touch
Your skin it feels a lot smoother the reason this happens is that retinoids compact smooth out and even out the top layer of the skin is called the stratum corneum so you can appreciate a skin smoothing effect at this point around 8 to 16 weeks you may start to appreciate some improvement in hyperpigmentation this is going to actually depend a lot however on the
Nature of the hyperpigmentation hyperpigmentation that’s down in the deeper parts of the skin it actually may be a little bit more apparent to you as the as that top layer of the skin is getting smoothed out and evened out around the 8 to 16 week mark though you can start to see improvement in any hyperpigmentation that you have up higher in the skin this isn’t
Going to be the case for everybody but that is around a window of time where you may start noticing some differences if your skin tends to heal with hyperpigmentation using a retinoid actually can reduce the risk that hyperpigmentation will occur in the first place so it’s preventative against hyperpigmentation provided you are using it alongside sun protective
Behaviors including wearing sunscreen and avoiding staying out in the sun too long seeking shade wearing a broad brimmed hat and sun protective clothing many people though are pursuing retinoids for getting rid of wrinkles and fine lines that takes time the reason it takes time is because it takes time to boost up the collagen production in the deeper layers of
The skin but actually around 16 weeks of consistent use you may start to begin to appreciate a subtle improvement in very fine wrinkles and fine lines what about the improvement of acne when will acne start getting better i mentioned earlier at the beginning of the video that the purging period if it occurs tends to resolve at most at the latest six weeks you can
Actually depending on the severity of your acne you may actually start to see improvement in the acne as early as two weeks but generally speaking the earliest people typically start to see improvement is around six weeks sometimes not even until three months of consistent use it all depends on you know your acne and and how your skin responds to it so it’s not
You know reproducible from person to person but in general we’re saying the earliest you could really start to see improvement is six weeks and three months is is you know really when when it should be when it should be working so if you’ve got acne i wouldn’t even bother to ask yourself is this actually working until the three-month mark you may appreciate some
Improvement and you can feel confident that it’s working one thing that’s important to know too about acne is that for some people the acne will improve but it won’t clear in total for a lot of people actually topical retinoids they’re fantastic for acne because they control uh how the cells divide and proliferate and become who they’re supposed to be and as a
Result that helps control poor clogging it retinoids also reduce inflammation in the skin that drives papule formation pustule formation those inflammatory cysts but oftentimes for many people a topical retinoid alone is not enough other treatments may need to be added to that so don’t think that it’s not working because your face is not completely clear or you
Are still having breakouts it’s just part of the treatment process you will need to go back and see your dermatologist for evaluation and other medications may be needed in some cases too for acne your dermatologist may elect to either increase the percentage strength of the retinoid they have prescribed you or they may elect to switch you to another topical retinoid
It is really about the conversation between you and your dermatologist i cannot predict that for you you’ve got to talk to your derm but do you know for many people with acne retinoids help tremendously but they’re not always enough on their own other things may need to be added so i alluded to the fact earlier that when it comes to hyperpigmentation retinoids
Actually can help prevent hyperpigmentation in the first place because of the way they work to reduce inflammation provided you are using them in conjunction with sun protection but here’s another added benefit of using a topical retinoid that many of you who are using them probably don’t even realize is happening in your favor and that is topical retinoid use
Can accelerate the rate of healing from wounds if you undergo microdermabrasion treatment or a resurfacing laser treatment many dermatologists and plastic surgeons will start you on a topical retinoid to use two weeks before the treatment because that has been shown to accelerate the rate of healing and to improve the healing outcomes so it reduces the time of
Healing to use a topical retinoid in advance so if you are already using a topical retinoid and you happen to get a cut in that area your skin will heal faster it’s probably something you don’t even realize is happening so they really do help your skin in many many ways what about for more prominent wrinkles well you’ve got to use the retinoid consistently for at
Least six months to really start to see any benefit in that area and it will be subtle it won’t be you know a complete erasure of prominent furrows or deep wrinkles so set your expectations that at most you’re going to get some modest improvement but you’re also going to have smoothing of the skin likely and possibly an improvement in any hyperpigmentation that
You have so overall you know look at yourself overall i highly suggest taking photographs of your face before and you know maybe every every three months while using a topical retinoid to document it can be a tremendous benefit to you to see how the retinoid is changing your skin how long is it safe to keep using it topical retinoids are safe to use long-term
Uninterrupted with the exception of for certain procedures your dermatologist or whoever is performing the procedure may ask you to stop any retinoids a lot of laser procedures for example laser hair removal you know that might be advised or before you have facial waxing you want to stop a few weeks before because you can get little sores because that retinoid is
Smoothing out the top layer of the skin there’s less for the wax to pull away so you can get little sores so that would be a situation where you would want to temporarily stop your retinoid or if you become pregnant retinoids are contraindicated during pregnancy but otherwise they are safe to use daily indefinitely there’s no evidence of any harmful effects to the
Skin they help to reduce activation of enzymes that chew up collagen upon exposure to uv to help your body clear out damaged skin cells and for people who have a lot of sun damage and make a lot of skin cancers a topical retinoid can help minimize the formation of and clear some of those early little pre-k skin cancers referred to as actinic keratoses so they do have
A lot of benefits i already mentioned they can improve healing after about six months of consistent use though more collagen will start to be produced in the deeper layers of the skin and that can have benefit not only for wrinkles but for also for atrophic acne scars boxcar scars and ice pick scars you may start to notice that those are a lot smoother a lot more
Level with long-term consistent use starting at about six months you really start to get improvement in collagen production in the deeper layers of the skin so that corresponds with kind of a smoothing out of any any like boxcar or rolling scars they’re called i have videos on these types of scars as a matter of fact so check those out but yeah topical retinoid
After about six months you may start to see some improvement in those those things as well the benefits of a topical retinoid persist for one month after stopping but after that you know things start to reaccumulate and therefore you need to continue to use the topical retinoid in order to maintain the results but you may find that after using a topical retinoid
For a year a year and a half you don’t necessarily need to use it every day in order to maintain those results if it’s for photo aging specifically you may not need to continue to use it on a daily basis in order to maintain those results you may only need to use it a few times a week actually now when it comes to acne you may still need to use it on a daily basis
It really just boils down to you and your acne and again that’s something to chat with your dermatologist about but for from a cost perspective since a lot of you guys buy topical retinoids out of pocket for cosmetic reasons for you know the anti-aging benefits well you may find that after a year and a half or so of using it say daily or every other day you may
Be able to back down in frequency in order to maintain those results because that’s at least what the literature shows and that may be more cost effective for you but the bottom line is results do not happen overnight if you don’t have acne and you are using a topical retinoid say for the anti-aging benefits just because you don’t necessarily see any results it
Doesn’t mean that the medication is not working in your favor you may be someone who isn’t starting out with a lot of sun damage that’s obvious or a lot of hyperpigmentation that’s obvious or your hyperpigmentation may just not be responsive to the retinoid it doesn’t necessarily mean though that the retinoid is not benefiting the skin and other avenues so don’t
Necessarily assume that you know your face doesn’t really look too different that it’s not benefiting you if you don’t have acne do you even need to use a retinoid in the first place no it’s not a requirement to use a retinoid and i will point out that many studies using topical retinoids actually show that in the placebo arm that is getting cream with no retinoid
In it those individuals see some improvement as well they don’t see as much improvement as the group that’s using topical retinoids but they do see some improvement and the reason for that likely is that in order to participate in these trials the participants are required to use sun protection and they are counseled on sun protective behavior so they need to
Wear sunscreen daily and we know that wearing sunscreen daily and protecting your skin from the sun can help in clearing existing photo damage and preventing further photo damage in the future so if you’re looking for something for anti-aging that’s inexpensive doesn’t require a prescription doesn’t require the retinoid uglies make sure you’re wearing sunscreen
And protecting your skin from the sun you will likely see benefit from doing that all right y’all i hope that helped kind of mark out the timeline that you can expect with using a topical retinoid it’s going to differ from person to person quite a bit anywhere from you know weeks off to maybe even months some people don’t see any benefit with a topical retinoid
Until around six months it all really just depends kind of on you what you’re starting out with maybe even the type of retinoid that you’re using and how it interacts with your skin it is a very individualized outcome this is a general timeline of course this video is for educational purposes definitely discuss with the prescriber if your results that you are
Getting the reaction that you’re having with the medication is appropriate for you i hope this was helpful let me know in the comments if you have gone through the retinoid uglies otherwise known as the retinitization process uh before or if you are newly starting out a topical retinoid and you’re apprehensive about that hopefully this video allayed your fears on
The insulate i’m going to put my recent video comparing tretinoin to zeratine for anti-aging purposes so you can learn more about that there but if you enjoyed this video give it a thumbs up share it with your friends and as always don’t forget sunscreen and subscribe i’ll talk to you guys tomorrow bye so you
Transcribed from video
HOW LONG IT TAKES TO SEE RESULTS FROM YOUR RETINOID @Dr Dray By Dr Dray
