The best skin care available to you,  begins with the valuable understanding that  doing a little homework now, will go a long way for your skin in the future.  If your here, your on the right track.

• Is a window to our internal health and will not only reflect regular internal activity i.e.. hydration, hormonal shifts etc, but also can reveal possible health concerns i.e. rocacea's (red tiny bumps resembling acne) internal link to the body's vascular and circulatory system.

Step Two:   Know What Your Skin Needs.

Your best skin care builds on general skin care needs, and fine tuned to meet your unique skin concerns.

Skin needs to be:

• Protected-External factors such as sun exposure, pollution and contact with irritating things or products, can result in inflammation and even damage. Protecting our skin daily with sunscreen, will be the most effective preventative measure we can take against aging and wrinkles. In addition, imagine just how much money would be saved.
  

• Cared for-Most of us need to daily cleanse and moisturize our skin and understand the best way to do it. Most of us will benefit from regular skin exfoliation. All of us, regardless of skin color, or geographical location, need to use sunscreen daily. Knowing our skin type, will determine the details of the methods and products.

Step Three:  Know Your Skin Type.

Your best skin care will come from knowing your individual skin care needs fine tuned by experience and common sense.

• Determine your skin type - There are some general guidelines that help us categorize the type of skin we have and how we can go about caring for it.  

• Fine Tune- Since there are so many individual differences among us, these categories can not provide absolute specifics.  Use the general guidelines to provide a context to work within, and support the essentials of skin care but use some common sense to make smart and effective product choices that will serve your own individual needs.

Step Four:  Establish Your Best Skin Care Regime.

Your best skin care will be founded on a simple but solid consistent regime but also take into account special needs.  

• Your basic skin care regime will incorporate these key elements; 1.  cleanse, 2.  exfoliate, 3.  moisturize (unless you have full fledge oily skin), and 4.  use sunscreen.

• Your best skin care regime will fine tune this regime to meet your skin's special needs.  The objective is still to keep it simple as you effectively meet needs. 

  Special needs and other common sense considerations will shape your routine daily, weekly and monthly.

  Special Needs- i.e. incorporating acne treatment or anti-aging treatment 
  Daily needs-  i.e. morning vs. evening regimens 
  -morning; cleanse, moisturize, sunscreen (some moisturizers come with sun protection)
  -evening; cleanse, exfoliation method, treatment, rich moisturizer
  Weekly needs- i.e.  Sundays-use of special treatment mask like deep pore cleansing or exfoliating masks
  Monthly- i.e. Skin care treatments like a facial performed by an experienced professional.

Step Five:  Choose Your Skin Care Products Wisely.

Well worth your while, is making effective product choices for your best skin care.

• Narrow down product choices that cater to your skin type for each step of your skin care routine.  
• Ideally, you will make your choices based on research, recommendations, customer feedback and a sense that the product is the right fit for your skin care needs. 

Here are a few of my recommendations on best skin care product choices:

• Sunscreen:  This item should be worn daily and with full spectrum effective ingredients like titanium oxide (physical barrier), or avobenzone (chemical barrier).  Plus NEW recently approved Mexoryl and Tinosorb. Often the use of a quality sunscreen for faces can replace a daily moisturizer, leaving your daily best skin care regime as simple as cleanse and put on sunscreen.

  CHEMICAL Block (absorb UVR):	AVOBENZONE (Parsol 1789) MEXORYL new! TINOSORB new!
  PHYSICAL Block (reflect UVR):	TITANIUM DIOXIDE, ZINC OXIDE

  Getting excellent customer feedback is SkinCeuticals Physical UV Defense SPF 30.  It is non chemical and has a special formulation to reduce the whitening effect found in other physical sun blocks.  Safe for all skin types including sensitive, traumatized and safe for children.

• Night Regimes:  The best skin care for a night regime covers quite a range in possible product recommendations.  Age, skin type, skin conditions etc will dictate product use for this important skin recovery time frame.

• Acne Breakouts:  Depending on the severity and frequency of the breakouts consider Mario Badescu products, who now serves a larger community than his cult following of celebrities and New Yorkers.

  

   Step Six:  Monitor The Results Being Achieved By Your Product Choices

  Keep an eye on your skin and don't be afraid to move on to other recommended product, if the one you have chosen is not delivering or even worse, causing irritation.  What you will discover sometimes is, what works for some, may not work for you, even if you are seemingly the same skin type.  (There are other, more complicated factors that come into play that will determine how well skin products will perform on your skin.  Note the often posted study disclaimer in the advertisement, "results may vary".)

  Step Seven:  Adapt To Your Skin's Changes Over Time

  Your skin is dynamic.  That means a variety of conditions, internal and external, can influence its behavior creating change.  These behaviors can be short term or long term.  Things like short term hormonal changes may increase or decrease the amount of oil production in your skin sending your skin in directions of breakouts or dryness.  Long term changes, such as related to aging, will reveal collagen production diminishing.  Luckily, most changes will be gradual and manageable.