Face Facts

Scoop Magazine #58, Summer 2011/12
Beth Muhling | 25 Aug 2010

Sugar and spice and all things nice – whatever can iron out wrinkles and restore the bloom of youth, we’ll have some, thanks. People are willing to shell out big bucks for face creams – but what proof is there that they actually work?

You’ve read the lines in magazines – “hydrates, smoothes and gives skin a radiant glow”– and seen the beautiful bottles and lovely wrinkle-free faces on TV. Cosmetics companies loudly tout the value of their over-the-counter products and ingredients, but amid all these extravagant claims, not to mention extravagant prices, do you ever wonder just what exactly you’re being sold?

In the quest for dewy, youthful skin some of us are willing to pay a mind-boggling $1500 for 50ml (or $980 for 30ml) of a cream called Cellular Cream Platinum Rare, from Swiss company La Prairie. High-end indeed – this one’s atop the Matterhorn – but that’s just where La Prairie wants it. The company says with 10 million millionaires worldwide, luxury products are in demand.

La Prairie says the cream smoothes and provides intensive moisture and firming agents to boost collagen production. The rare metal platinum is the hero ingredient here. Nano-sized particles of it – the company’s scientists apparently discovered that it had incomparable anti-ageing properties – are used to “recharge the skin’s electrical balance”. Australian marketing manager Ai San Chew explains: “What we mean is realigning the positive and negative charges within the skin’s outermost layer.” This allows moisture in and keeps ageing free radicals out, she adds.
Joyful yodelling all round. But wait, there’s an echo – it’s all very well to be told all this by the company, but do independent trials show this platinum-dust potion actually works?

“We don’t see clinical trials as a meaningful way of communicating the benefits of the product given that each customer’s skin and preferences are different,” Ai San says.

What she can tell us is that since its launch here in May 2009, “a large proportion” of first-time users have bought it again and many more say they would if they could – “...this is a sure indication of customer satisfaction in the results,” she says.

So that’s platinum – what else on this beautiful blue planet might keep us looking young and gorgeous? Seaweed, perhaps, found in the popular Crème de la Mer, a mere $440 (60ml) or $250 (30ml). The website says it was created in the US by Dr Max Huber, who pioneered the use of sea kelp in skincare. The company didn’t offer any details about clinical trials, but a blog by a cosmetic scientist (colinsbeautypages.co.uk) adds insight.

The blog says: “Cosmetic scientists have long been seeking the best polymer to combat wrinkles… Polymers derived from seaweed are particularly good. And you can change the behaviour of polymers by the way you treat them. Crème de la Mer has a long treatment process for the seaweed, which might well affect the way it works. I don’t have any proof... but it is believable.”

Many companies do offer figures and results of trials, but these must be viewed cautiously, says Cathy Reid, honorary secretary of the Australasian College of Dermatologists. She says studies often concentrate on the opinions of test subjects and don’t have a scientific basis. It seems the mind plays tricks because she also quotes a study on a cream in which 30 per cent of subjects thought the placebo was “the best thing since sliced bread”.

“We consider a clinical trial one that’s done in a double-blind controlled fashion, where neither investigator or patient know what product’s being used,” Dr Reid says. “There should always be a placebo and it should look and smell exactly like the other one.” Those conducting the test should not know who has the active product, she adds.

This method promotes objectivity. As do independent trials, rather than in-house ones, she says, because if researchers are paid by the company there may be conflicts of interest.

Some companies are moving towards more scientific methods of assessment, she adds. For example, skin biopsies are taken to document microscopic changes in the epidermis (the skin’s outer layer) and the dermis (the layer beneath it).

Dr Reid says tretinoin, a form of vitamin A, used to reduce fine lines and blotches, is the only thing scientifically proven to work. Three cheers for tretinoin! But you won’t buy it over the counter – it’s a prescription-only cream. Another form of vitamin A, Retinol, is used in consumer creams but doesn’t have the same proven benefits, Dr Reid says.

If the doctor’s words have dampened the party mood, Loredana Farina, Chair of the Advanced Association of Beauty Therapists (CIDESCO Section Australia), has a different view.
Loredana says to look for products containing vitamins A, C and E because they fight damaging free radicals. “They’re listed according to the percentage of the ingredients so the first item on the list on the jar… is the most active substance.”

Retinol stimulates collagen to help rebuild skin and alpha hydroxy aicds (AHAs) expose new skin, making it more receptive to products, she adds. What about the peptide Argireline, said to freeze and inhibit the formation of wrinkles? “It’s used by many cosmetic houses with visible results.”

A method called ‘needling’ can also be used at home, she says. A roller with fine pins is applied to create tiny openings in the skin, boosting its response to a cream by a whopping 10,000 per cent.

Roll out the roller! Sounds a bit scary but Loredana should know what she’s talking about – she’s been in the business for 30 years.

But no matter the claims and counterclaims, many of us buy cosmetics for reasons barely associated with their proven efficacy. Look at the designer bottles many are packaged in. Are they part of the joy of buying the product? Professor Jill Sweeney from the Marketing Discipline Group at UWA Business School says when buying a product, people are really buying an experience, and packaging is part of it.

They also want the store and the counter to be attractive and the salesperson to be pleasant.

“They want the entire experience to be pleasing and that’s then associated with the product and the packaging when they bring it home,” she says.

However, she adds, people are now aware of the need for less packaging, for environmental reasons. Quality goods are also more attractive than fancy packaging. On the other hand, buying a beauty product could be seen as giving ourselves a treat. “People just want that experience for a luxury item, not on most occasions,” she says.

But you won’t get pretty bottles from NeoStrata, the US company that started the AHA revolution. It spends its money on formulations, not packaging, says Josie Musolino of Hamilton Laboratories, which represents NeoStrata here.

“The most expensive part of any skincare product is fragrance and packaging,” she says.

The company was set up by a dermatologist and dermatopharmacologist, who discovered the benefits of AHAs, derived from foods (Cleopatra got there first – she bathed in sour milk).

Josie explains that AHAs smoothen by stripping dead skin cells, and also stimulate the production of new collagen, which helps increase firmness and reduce the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles.

The company says after receiving the patent in 1978, the founders spent 10 years trying to get skincare companies to listen before starting their own. Once other companies caught on, they began licensing the patent to use AHAs.

In 1996, after a decade of providing a brand to dermatologists, NeoStrata began creating consumer products. They’ve now taken AHAs to the next level – polyhydroxy acids (PHAs).

A PHA, a lactobionic acid, makes up 10 per cent of NeoStrata Bionic Face Serum, $68 (30ml). An in-house study on a cream with eight per cent lactobionic acid showed reduced fine lines by 37 per cent and laxity improvement of 16 per cent.

The study was done on 31 women aged 35-60 with mild to moderate sun damage over 12 weeks. Tests included trained evaluators doing an under-eye Pinch Recoil test (pinching skin and recording time to recovery). This is a recognised indicator of skin firmness, the company says. They also collected plumping measurements on treated and untreated forearms. Biopsies were also taken.

So that all sounds pretty comprehensive, but how do some of the glamorous, well-known companies – and some of the less well-known – stack up in the scientific research stakes?
Clarins says its Generation 6 Double Serum, $103 (30ml), reduces the appearance of wrinkles and helps restore firmness. For age 25 plus, ingredients include pine, rocket, kiwi fruit and marula. Clarins says in tests 70 per cent of users noticed fewer fine lines and wrinkles and 82 per cent noticed they had more luminous skin.

For women age 50 plus, Guerlain has the Success Age Splendid range – Deep-Action Day Care, $263, and Night Care, $316 (both 50ml).

Guerlain says at this age a woman’s skin changes so that it’s exposed to more androgens (male hormones) than before, leading to slackening and dryness. Its Intense Magnolia Concentrate, it says, “helps diminish the production of receptors available to androgens” by 77 per cent (in vitro tests, which means in a test tube) and so stimulates the action of oestrogens (female hormones).

It says clinical evaluation by a dermatologist on 31 women after eight weeks of using the day cream showed “improvement of slackening on the face observed in 94 per cent of subjects” and “smoother, denser and more elastic skin… in 100 per cent.” Instrumental measurement on 24 women showed “improvement of slackening on face… in 80 per cent of subjects.”
Fion So from Guerlain says testing is usually done in-house. She does add that Guerlain’s head of research collaborates with medical specialists.

The less well-known Swede Success made a splash in 2003 with its 24 Hour Original Creme, $98 (50ml). Back then the company was called Shi’Jäno – a tricky name for non-Scandi types, perhaps – and the product was D&N Creme. The website says it’s the only non-prescriptive face cream with a clinical trial proving “a reduction of wrinkles by an average of 51 per cent (and up to 65 per cent) over a 12-week period as published in the prestigious British Journal of Dermatology”.

An independent trial – a double-blind, placebo-controlled study – was done by Karolinska University Hospital’s Chairman of Dermatology, who used laser technology to measure wrinkle depth.

Small molecules that penetrate into the dermis and alpha lipoic acid (not an AHA) are said to be the key. The company says: “Studies show that oxidised vitamins E and C in the…dermis… are converted into an active form when the lipoic acid reaches the skin cells. Both... are strong antioxidants... Studies also indicate that lipoic acid stimulates skin cells to convert skin’s existing vitamin A into vitamin A acid, which also has a repairing effect on wrinkles.”

Results for the company’s Lifting Serum, $105 (30ml), were also impressive and were published in the international journal Phytomedicine in 2007.

Dr Reid points to another product that made it into the British Journal of Dermatology last year – UK company Boots No 7 Protect & Perfect Intense Beauty Serum (£20.50 ($35.50) for 30ml), which underwent a clinical trial (funded by Boots) at the University of Manchester.

It showed 70 per cent of subjects had “significantly fewer” wrinkles after a year of daily use. It works by stimulating production of the protein fibrillin-1. You can’t buy it here but if visiting the UK, drop into Boots.

So, make up your own mind – is it the alluring “come hither” of the top shelf for you, or a supermarket skincare cream that doesn’t cost as much as a mortgage payment?