Health: Vitamin E

Benefits of Vitamin e for Skin

In terms of skin health and skin care, vitamin e benefits are numerous. In fact, skin care products that contain vitamin e have become an essential part of healthy skin care.

Antioxidant

First of all, because of its antioxidant activity, vitamin e is vital in protecting skin cells from ultra violet light, pollution, drugs, and other elements that produce cell damaging free radicals. It is believed that vitamin e is most effective in its natural alcohol form rather than its acetate form where it is a less effective antioxidant. Watch for this in the labelling of skin care products.

Regulator for Vitamin A

The benefits of vitamin e for healthy skin care also include its ability to regulate vitamin a in the body, which itself is important for healthy skin.

Anti-Aging Benefits of Vitamin E

Vitamin e added to lotions, creams, and other skin care products, as well as taken orally, plays a role in the anti-aging of skin. It helps skin look younger by reducing the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles. Also, free radicals are believed to play an important role in skin aging and therefore the antioxidant activity is quite valuable for this skin problem.

Sun Protection and Sun Burn Treatment

Vitamin e lotions provide some benefit in preventing and treating sunburns. These lotions protect the epidermis layer of the skin from early stages of ultra violet light damage. Vitamin e preparations also increase the effectiveness of sunscreens. Such lotions do not work immediately. They must be applied about 20 minutes before sun exposure in order to allow the vitamin e to be absorbed deep into the epidermis layer.

Treatment of Skin Diseases

Vitamin e can aid in the treatment of various skin diseases or skin conditions. Topical applications such as those used to treat psoriasis is one of the benefits of vitamin e. Orally ingested vitamin e can help treat erythema (a skin inflammation that results in reddish, painful, and tender lumps).

Treatment of Scars

This is one of the more controversial benefits of vitamin e. Initially, it was thought that vitamin e was very beneficial in the prevention and treatment of scarring (acne scars or surgical scars) and healing of skin from various forms of damage such as burns. Some recent research has questioned this benefit of vitamin e. In fact some studies have indicated that vitamin e creams do not help prevent surgical scarring and may actually make the scar look worse. This is in opposition to the experience of a number of individuals that claim vitamin e creams help soften the appearance of scars.

Skin Cancer

One of the most important benefits of vitamin e is the prevention of skin cancer. This occurs because of its sun protection quality and of course its powerful antioxidant properties, which help reduce or prevent sun damage.

Other

There are a variety of other benefits of vitamin e for skin care:

• vitamin e products help reduce the appearance of stretch marks
• vitamin e can help prevent the appearance of age spots
• it helps maintain the skin’s oil balance during the cleansing process
• it reduces transepidermal water loss from skin and strengthens the skin’s barrier function

Overall for skin care, more benefit is obtained from topical application of vitamin e through creams or lotions rather than taking vitamin e orally. Skin is able to absorb natural vitamin e effectively. However, taking vitamin e orally is important for the good health of other areas of the body.

The recommended skin lotions and creams by many experts are those that contain the alcohol form of vitamin e (alpha-tocopherol) instead of the acetate form (alpha-tocopherol acetate). The acetate form does not penetrate the skin’s surface well and provides less of the benefits of vitamin e such as antioxidant activity for the skin.

Why is vitamin e important for good health?

There are several benefits of vitamin e for your body. Some preliminary studies involving intakes of vitamin e higher than the daily-recommended requirement have shown that vitamin e may be useful in treating or possibly preventing:

• menstrual pain
• low sperm count
• inflammation of eye tissues
• cataracts
• restless leg syndrome or relief from muscle cramping
• Alzheimer’s disease
• Parkinson’s disease
• rheumatoid arthritis
• asthma
• various diabetes related complications and maybe helpful in treating and preventing diabetes itself
• cardiovascular disease
• prostate cancer and breast cancer

Benefits of vitamin e also include helping the body increase and regulate the levels of vitamin a in the body and as a general immune system booster, especially in older adults. Topical vitamin e might also promote good blood circulation and prevent the formation of blood clots, especially in people with diabetes.

The problem is that although it is agreed that vitamin e is a very useful and essential vitamin for humans (especially for its antioxidant activity), many of the stated benefits of vitamin e are anecdotal. There are few in depth studies available to verify some of the benefits of vitamin e claims that are being made. However, there are numerous informal reports of individuals insisting significant health benefits with increased levels of vitamin e. Further scientific study will help to target specifically whether vitamin e truly does play a role in treating or preventing the conditions mentioned above.

Additional Vitamin E Resources

For information on foods containing vitamin e, visit the vitamin e foods page.

More information on vitamin e food sources can be found at the vitamin e food sources page.

Information on the deficiency of vitamin e can be found at the vitamin e deficiency page.

The vitamin e overdose page discusses the symptoms and side effects of too much vitamin e.

The following link discusses vitamin E scar healing and scar fading.

Source: http://www.healthy-skincare.com/benefits-of-vitamin-e.html