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In the next century, pharmacies will be at the forefront of efforts to sell scientifically advanced skin care. In the first of a series, we look at the main areas of research. This month: vitamin A. By Imogen Matthews
Fifteen years ago, premium companies pioneered anti-ageing techniques, but high prices put many of these products out of the reach of most people.
Since then, the mass market has been able to make enormous progress in the science of skin care because these major brands are owned by large multinational companies which can afford to resource dedicated teams of dermatologists and immunologists in skin care laboratories. Companies like Johnson & Johnson, Procter & Gamble, Revlon and L'Oreal are devoting huge sums of money to research and development in the search for new ingredients and processes so that they can provide a steady stream of superior products offering unparalleled performance.
The New Jersey-based Revlon Research Centre alone has published 350 patents since 1971 and its Skin Care Laboratory's Advanced Research Group is continually discovering new information about how human skin works and how it can be enhanced.
COSMECEUTICAL SKIN CARE
The result of this merging of science and cosmetics has been to create a new generation of skin care products called 'cosmeceuticals', which lack the medicinal function of pharmaceuticals. The skin care giants are very aware of the limitations imposed on them by cosmetics regulations. The term 'cosmeceutical' is a hybrid of cosmetics and pharmaceuticals, says Revlon's new vice principal of research and development for skin care, Dr Patricia Siuta. "We have our hands tied by the Food & Drugs Administration in the US as to what we can put in skin care products. We are a cosmetic company, not a drugs manufacturer."
But tight controls on the boundaries between cosmetics and pharmaceuticals have not stopped manufacturers from pushing back the frontiers as far as they are allowed in order to create skin care brands that produce real and visible results.
Anti-ageing has been the area of greatest innovation, spurred on by post-war baby boomers who are now in, or approaching, their 50s. This generation has already grown up with skin care, but as the signs of ageing appear, such as fine lines, loss of skin...