If you’ve seen a medical doctor/dermatologist about your rosacea, psoriasis or eczema, you have probably tried some form of cortisone. It was probably somewhat effective in reducing the itching, redness and discomfort your skin gives you. But have you ever tried to stop using it and seen what happens? Your symptoms likely came back, and you wondered with frustration whether you’d need to continue using the drug forever. Perhaps you even wondered if there were any side effects to long-term use should you have to use it that way to mana
ge your skin condition.
Here are the proven side effects of using corticosteroids:
1. Immune suppression. Synthetic cortisone is a drug that reduces inflammation. How does it do that, you may ask. It does so by suppressing the immune response. Inflammation is as necessary, normal and healthy reaction to tissue injury, however it may happen (invasion by bacteria, for example). Excessive inflammation results in swelling, heat, redness and pain. Enter cortisone: the body’s own anti-inflammatory hormone. But when you use synthetic corticosteroids you can’t control just how much inflammation you are suppressing, and ultimately, how severely the immune system is suppressed. The concern here is, if the immune system is suppressed enough, it can leave you prone to infections of all kinds.
2. Excess cortisone increases risk of diabetes, increase belly fat and reduces muscle mass. If you’re wondering how to find out if that’s what’s happening to you, click here.
3. Oral corticosteroids can reduce bone density is as little as 3 months of regular use. That’s right: if you started using it as a teen by the age of 28 you could have the bones of a 70 year old woman!
4. Water retention. Most of us don’t aim for a bloated, marshmallow-y look—but that is what you may get when you’re using oral corticosteroids. (You can find out if you are retaining water with this simple and accurate measurement.)
You might think you are safe using cortisone topically. While it is true that this will tend to act locally rather than systemically, here are a couple of additional concerns that crop up with regular use:
- Skin thinning. With regular use, cortisone creams will reduce skin thickness where they are applied. You’ve seen the hands of your old aunt Mabel. Do you want transparent, thin skin that wrinkles that easily?
- Increased skin sensitivity/ allergenicity. Like many drugs, you can become hypersensitive or allergic to it if you use it for a long period of time.
Have you experienced any of the above side effects of using corticosteroids? Leave your comment below.
There is a much safer way to deal with your itching red skin. It will take some effort; as they say, to get change, you need to change. It’s The Clear Skin Program, and it will change your life—for the better.