Office Everything you need to know about the pulse oximeter, that device that measures your oxygen without leaving home
Digestive How to deal with intestinal disorders every summer
Tips Summer children's otitis, this is how they are and how to avoid the most frequent earaches in children between 5 and 12 years old
Precautions This is how summer affects your blood pressure
If we go to
the medical literature,
dark
circles
are technically called "
idiopathic hyperchromia of the orbital ring
", but they need no introduction.
It is enough to look in the mirror in the morning after a bad night, or after a shift at the hospital, to see them first hand.
Dark circles
are not in themselves a disease or a health problem
, although it is enough to take a walk through the cosmetics section of any establishment to realize that they
are an aesthetic problem that worries a large part of the population
.
If you want to know more about them, I invite you to continue reading.
I can't promise they'll go away, but at least you'll know what's wrong.
Why do we have dark circles?
The main reasons why unwanted dark circles appear can be summarized in three.
Excess pigmentation
.
It is generally the classic brown circles under the eyes, and it usually appears due to having sunbathed too much and without adequate photoprotection.
Genetics
.
Yes, dark circles can also be inherited.
They are people who have the area of the skin of the eyelids darker than the rest throughout the year, whatever they do, and it is even more accentuated when sunbathing.
This genetic cause can cause us to have
hyperpigmentation in the area
, skin that is thinner than normal or a greater number of blood vessels under the eyelids.
Visible blood vessels
.
It is the
typical purplish-colored circle under
your eyes , and it can be marked more by lack of sleep, fatigue and stress, since this causes a dilation of the blood vessels.
Why do they only appear around the eyes?
Of all the skin on the face, dark circles appear only on the eyelids, around the eyes.
The explanation for this fact is that
in that area of the face
, especially in the lower eyelid,
the skin is up to five times thinner than in the rest of the face
.
The thickness is minimal, half a millimeter thick, and therefore any skin problem will be much more visible.
Is it true that ointments for hemorrhoids help?
First of all, it should be clarified that there are several types of anti-hemorrhoidal ointments on the market, and they are not all the same.
There are anesthetic ones, with corticosteroids, with heparin that improve blood flow... and there are also those that contain
ephedrine
, a compound that acts by draining and constricting blood vessels.
This is the
active ingredient that could temporarily make our dark circles less visible
, but if we apply it we must be very careful for two reasons:
it cannot enter the eye and the anesthetic contained in the ointment is photosensitizing
, so if the sun hits us in the following hours our skin can be significantly irritated.
A slice of cucumber on each eye, an infallible remedy?
If we talk about dark circles, one of the things that first comes to mind is the image of a person with a slice of cucumber on each eye to treat them.
I'm sorry to tell you
this won't work.
Cucumber has many beneficial properties for our body, but eating it in a salad or grilled, not placing it on the eyes.
For it to have any positive effect on dark circles, we would have to
take the cucumber directly from the fridge just before placing it on the skin
, and this effect would be due to the fact that it is cold and not because it is a slice of this vegetable.
The cold will contract the capillaries
, reduce blood flow in the eyelid area and therefore the dark circles will be reduced.
Do dark circles increase with age?
Generally as we age dark circles are more visible,
yes
.
One of the changes that takes place in our skin due to aging is that it becomes thinner,
paler and more transparent.
As a consequence, the blood capillaries that are just under our skin will become more visible, and in an already fine area such as the dark circles, it will make it more marked.
And the bags under the eyes?
The bags are another of the aesthetic problems of the face that usually worry the most, but they are something totally different from dark circles.
They can be caused by
fluid retention
(something that is more common in the morning, especially if we have slept face down) or by
loss of muscle tone
in the lower eyelid, which causes the characteristic sagging of the skin.
Conforms to The Trust Project criteria
Know more
Overwhelmed Nurse