A very important and almost sacred rule of skincare is that when applying most skincare products, less is more. I said most, because there are two exceptions to this rule. The first exception is traditional carbon based sunscreens and a few weeks ago I showed you to apply as much as a whole ounce to your entire body to make sure your are putting enough on to ensure that you’ll get the full rated value of that SPF protection. The second exception concerns the antibiotic ointments we use to help heal wounded, injured skin. The type on injuries you get from a cut, a scratch or even coming to my office and getting a growth removed. Under these circumstances with the antibiotic ointment more is better because you want to keep the wound moist all the time. The wound heals much faster and heals much better in a moist environment. We used to think, let it dry out to the air and form a scab but we found out that those dry scabs actually slow and impede the healing. So, for instance, if I were to have a wound on my hand the size of this red mark I would put an amount of antibiotic ointment on that which is almost the size of a small pea. That amount of ointment if we were using a chem-free sunscreen would be enough to cover my entire face but on this wound is the proper amount to keep it moist. I then take a band-aid, put a band-aid on top of that and as I press down on the band-aid it doesn’t squeeze out from the sides but it is nice and moist. The purpose of the band-aid is to keep the ointment there; it’s the ointment that keeps the wound nice and moist. So remember, when you’re treating skin wounds with anti-biotic ointments, whether its polysporin, bacitracin or aquaphor healing ointment more is better, and you’ll get better and faster healing.
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