Summer Lip Care and Keeping it Healthy

Posted: July 10th, 2020

When it comes to healthy living in the sun and heat of summer, lips deserve as much care, if not more, than the rest of your skin. Because they have less protective melanin than the rest of your face, lips are at higher risk for sun damage and its complications. For example, many skin cancers begin on the lips, and they are subject to an unsightly and pre-malignant condition known as actinic cheilitis. Fortunately, taking care of your lips is easy during the summer. Here are some tips for summer lip maintenance:

Drink Lots of Water
The body loses water when it sweats, so it's important for your overall health and wellness to hydrate even if you don't feel particularly thirsty. It's true what the doctor says: drink eight to nine 8 ounce glasses of water every day. Drink more if you're exercising, and there's a heatwave passing through your town.

Apply Sunscreen
Applying the sunscreen you apply to the rest of you to your lips may be literally distasteful, but there are lip balms that contain sunscreen. For the best protection, use a lip balm with a sunscreen that has a sun protection factor, or SPF of 30 or higher. A good lip balm also adds moisture to your lips. Make sure you re-apply it every couple of hours.

Don't Use Lip Gloss
Though gloss can make the lips look luscious, the ones that have little or no color both bring the sun's damaging ultraviolet rays to the lips and have no sunscreen to protect them.

Skip the Lip Plumpers
No lip plumpers are another rule of summer. Lip plumper requires a minimally invasive cosmetic procedure, and they should be skipped when it's hot and humid. Heat makes the inevitable bruising and swelling that comes with lip plumpers or dermal fillers worse than they should be.