Today we answer the question: why do I still need vitamins in my skincare products if I eat a well-balanced diet?
These vitamins include retinoids (Vitamin A derivatives), antioxidants like Vitamins C and E, and Niacinamide (Vitamin B3). As you know, these are some of the most popular and recommended ingredients to apply on your skin by dermatologists.
So you may be wondering — if I ingest these vitamins through my diet or take multivitamins every day, then why do I need to also put these ingredients on my skin?
I actually wondered the same thing before starting Maelove. I'm personally really interested in supplements and always trying to keep up with the information out there, and I had asked myself the same question. This actually turned out to be a pretty complicated question, and the answer is different for each vitamin. So let's unpack one at a time.
Retinoids (Vitamin A): Targeted Application Avoids Systemic Risk
Let's look at retinoids, which are Vitamin A derivatives. You can take these orally by prescription — and that is one way to fix problems like acne. For example, you can get a prescription for Accutane, which is a retinoid called Isotretinoin. Accutane comes with a lot of downsides, though.
The reason is that Vitamin A has different functions in different parts of your body. Ingesting it at high levels can interfere with these processes in various ways and cause harm.
The reason we apply retinoids topically is to get all the skin benefits of a high-level Vitamin A product — without the complications of orally ingesting high levels that can have a systemic impact throughout the entire body. You get the collagen boost right where you want it.
Vitamin C: Blood Flow Declines With Age
Now, let's talk about Vitamin C, which is an important antioxidant with many health benefits — and some studies suggest it may even help prevent cancer.
As good as Vitamin C is, there are many controls in the body on how much is absorbed, and no matter how much you ingest, your body will only retain a certain amount. The rest comes out when you urinate. Why? Because Vitamin C is water-soluble — it doesn't accumulate in fat tissues the way Vitamin A can.
One thing to keep in mind is that especially as we get older, there is a limit to how much Vitamin C can reach our skin. While the exact mechanisms aren't entirely known, it has been shown that Vitamin C levels in your dermis and epidermis fall with aging — and dietary supplementation cannot overcome this deficit.
Since your epidermis needs to pull Vitamin C from the dermis (the deeper layer of skin that receives blood flow), decreased blood flow to your dermis may directly affect the levels in the epidermis.
There is a fascinating study published in 1993 by Tsuchida in the Journal of Dermatological Sciences that showed blood flow to your skin at 70 years old decreases to less than half — about 40% that of a 20 year old.
This is why topical supplementation — basically skincare products — can help. Instead of orally ingesting these vitamins and relying on blood flow to deliver them, you can get nutrients directly to the skin when blood flow is reduced through topical supplementation.
Niacinamide (Vitamin B3): Compensating for Cellular Aging
For Niacinamide, Vitamin B3, the picture is different yet again — and it relates to the fundamental aging of your cells, a process called senescence.
Basically, as you age, your cells become progressively worse at functioning properly. Niacinamide is important because it's a precursor to very important cofactors inside your cells. These cofactors are necessary for many enzymes to function properly — including enzymes that make lipids such as ceramides and proteins such as keratin, which make up your skin barrier (the bricks and mortar of the stratum corneum).
It has been shown that aging skin cells make less and less of these cofactors over time — but that you can increase the levels of these cofactors in older skin cells with Niacinamide supplementation. In other words, as you age, you need more Niacinamide to maintain the same level of Niacinamide-derived cofactors in your skin.
So when you topically supplement Niacinamide, you are introducing a heightened level of the vitamin to compensate for the senescence of your skin cells.
The Bottom Line: Oral and Topical Work Together
Both oral and topical supplementation of certain vitamins can help keep the health of your skin and body in tip-top shape. Topical supplementation helps increase the local levels of these beneficial vitamins directly where they're needed.
- Tsuchida Y (1993). "The effect of aging and arteriosclerosis on human skin blood flow." J Dermatol Sci 5(3): 175–181.
