My Top 5 Tips for Managing Sun Exposure

The below is taken from a response I gave to a reporter for an article called “What Top Doctors Tell Their Friends About the Sun”.

Part of my practice deals with excising cancerous lesions or closing complex wounds generated from oncologic surgery such as Moh’s surgery, which ensures a positive margin around a skin cancer excised but leaves that will be unpredictable size. Unfortunately, many of these patients have had repeated exposure to the sun and not taken proper care to protect their skin from its dangerous UV rays.

I am very conservative about sun exposure in my recommendations to family and friends. Here are my top 5 tips:

1. Avoid Peak Hours: Try to stay out of the sun between the hours of 10am and 4pm if at all possible. Or, limit your exposure during these times and make trips between shade and sun frequently. If in the water,  you need reapply almost constantly at least once an hour if fair-skinned.
2. Wear Daily Moisturizer:  Wear a daily moisturizer with at least SPF 30, but preferably SPF 50 if fair-skinned. (And, to avoid undergoing my neck lift, make sure you cover your neck / decolletage region as well.)
3. Mole Spot Checks: Head to a board-certified dermatologist once per year to have a professional check your body for signs of skin cancer. (I can recommend one if need be!)
4. Sunscreen: Wear sunscreen if outdoors even in the winter. One key activity a lot of people miss is skiing. Even when it is cloudy, harmful UV rays are hitting your skin.
5. “If you see something, say something”: I have treated more than one patient who lived with and ignored a rapidly changing, large melanoma lesion on their body for years with very significant ultimate consequences. Head to a board-certified dermatologist if anything looks awry.

Sun damage is by far the largest determinant of age-related formation of lines and wrinkles. Protecting yourself can help you delay the need for Botox treatments or facelift surgery! To reverse the appearance of some of these signs, I recommend either laser resurfacing or microneedling, but while these treatments are very effective at addressing aesthetic skin issues, they cannot reverse the underlying sun damage itself.