In this spring‑focused dermatology video, Dr. Shereene Idriss outlines the five most common body‑care errors she sees each year and offers evidence‑based solutions. She begins by warning against improper use of at‑home laser hair‑removal devices, explaining the difference between true lasers and IPL, recommending a true diode laser (Tria) and detailing safe usage steps such as patch testing, low‑power start, and realistic expectations. Next, she critiques aggressive physical scrubbing for keratosis pilaris, advocating chemical exfoliants (glycolic/lactic acid), urea‑rich moisturizers, retinoids (over‑the‑counter or prescription), and even laser treatment as gentler alternatives. The third mistake addresses neglect of body acne (backne, butt‑ne, chest acne); she identifies heat, sweat, occlusion, hair‑product residue, and heavy moisturizers as triggers, then prescribes targeted washes (benzoyl peroxide, salicylic acid sprays), antiseptic cleansers (Hibiclens), and behavioral changes like showering immediately after exercise and changing out of tight clothing. The fourth error is infrequent towel changes, which can foster mold, yeast, and fungal infections; she advises swapping towels twice a week and using multiple small face towels. Finally, she tackles inadequate sunscreen use, urging realistic, area‑specific application based on clothing, highlighting commonly missed spots (ears, nose, back of neck, hands, scalp), recommending appropriate re‑application timing, and suggesting supplemental physical barriers such as UV‑visors and rash guards. Throughout, Dr. Idriss blends clinical insight with practical, consumer‑friendly advice, ending with a call for viewer questions.
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The sun is finally shining, the temperatures are finally creeping up, and with that, so are the hemlines, and our eyes are being exposed to unwanted skin. And if you live in New York City and you've been to Central Park, trust, this is a fact, we do not necessarily want to see all the skin, but we are being exposed to it, and your skin is being exposed to the environment. But because many of us, and myself included, I am guilty of this, have neglected the skin from our neck down over the winter, a lot of skin concerns pop up every single spring, and I see an uptick within my office of patients coming in with concerns that range from unwanted hair to ingrown hairs to dark marks to acne, butt knee, back knee, you name it, they're coming in with it. And the worst part is, because we have neglected our skin for so long, we automatically go into let's do the most that we can possibly do. We go wrong and strong and we go rogue and we make the mistakes even worse, sometimes quite literally even burning our skin. And if In order to avoid you doing so, today we are going to cover the top 5 body skincare mistakes that I see every single year that hopefully this video is going to help you avoid so that you do not quite literally burn yourself. Mistake number 1 is the incorrect use of at-home laser hair removal. So during this time of year, the number of patients that I see who come into my practice with burns on their skin begins to skyrocket because everyone's trying to get rid of their hairs in a permanent fashion and they're going wrong and strong. My advice to you is don't do it. Fully understand that a lot of you either do not have access to a dermatologist, do not have access to a reputable place where they do laser hair removal, or you can't afford it. So you're gonna turn to in-home devices. So I want to educate you on this so that you can do it correctly for yourselves, but understanding the nuances, because the gold standard for hair removal is in-office laser treatments. A laser is a specific wavelength of light that can differentiate from your hair follicle versus your skin, targeting just the hair follicle, putting a lot of heat in your hair follicle to basically kill it off over time without burning your skin because it's targeting just the hair follicle. And that's how a laser works. There are different wavelengths that we have for different skin tones, but that's why the darker your skin, the riskier it is for you, or you need more treatments at a less intense level so that you do not burn your skin versus your Most at-home devices are not lasers, even though they're marketed as at-home laser devices. They're not. They are called IPLs. They are lights, also known as intense pulsed light, where the energy is much more scattered and less precise, and that can lead to a lot more burns. By the way, even in office. So when you are looking for an at-home device, you want to be looking for a true laser device, and that is why I usually recommend for an at-home laser device the Tria laser, which is a real diode laser. And thank you, Tria, for sponsoring this portion of the video. But this particular laser is— the reason I recommend it is it also has a 3-time contact sensor, so it's going to make sure that you have the right skin, there's no inappropriate contact with your skin, and you're targeting the right target before it shoots the laser, which adds a couple of security checks for you. But the— also the reason that I like it is because it is an actual laser, a diode laser that's going to be ideal for darker hair with lighter skin. How would I use this device? Because it is a laser, I would patch test it first. And when I say patch test, it's not just shoot it here, look at your skin, be like, okay, I'm fine, let me keep doing my whole face. It's patch test it, sit, wait 24 hours, look how your skin responds, and then do the rest of your body or whatever it is that you're trying to treat after ensuring that your skin is going to respond appropriately. Make sure you do not have a tan to minimize any risk of burning because it's a true laser. And so you want to use this correctly and appropriately. When starting off with the device, start off at the lowest level of power. Do not try to go to the highest level of power thinking you can tolerate it and then regretting it later. Low and slow, consistency over intensity, it is the name of the game with in-office treatments, with red tretinoin, with in-home laser hair removal devices. 32 zaps for the upper lip. A little bit along the chin. Sounds about right. It is a clinically proven device. The other thing that I would tell you is what do you expect to see when you use this device? First thing you notice is a slowdown in hair growth, and over time, after you continue to do the treatment, you will notice a decrease in hair density, meaning your hair becomes less intense in the areas that you treat. Having this device doesn't mean that you're going to lose all the hair overnight. It is powered at a much lower energy than an in-office laser, and therefore you're going to need more treatments. I hope you guys will take this with you and not burn yourselves moving forward as we move on to mistake number 2: harsh exfoliation on body. Okay, when it comes to texture and rough spots, so one thing that I see a lot of is people, especially in springtime, who automatically want to just go wrong and strong in terms of scrubbing their skin in terms of exfoliating any sort of rough bump that they have on their arms or their legs. And these rough bumps you may be dealing with is also known as keratosis pilaris, aka chicken skin, when we see the tiny little bumps around every hair follicle on the back of your arms or your thighs. And this happens when, when keratin builds up and plugs your hair follicle, leading to a bumpy texture. Now, scrubbing is not really going to work for you because the buildup is inside the follicle and not on the outside surface level of your skin, and it's not sitting on the most superficial aspects of your skin. So when you scrub super aggressively, you're not only irritating the outer skin barrier, but you're also making the redness and the texture look worse because of all of the abrasion that you're causing and all the inflammation that you're causing in the process. So what works better is number one, chemical exfoliants. Now I love glycolic acid and lactic acid because they also Glycolic acid especially helps to hydrate your skin, but this dissolves the bonds between the very superficial dead skin cells, allowing them to shed much more evenly, even within hair follicles. So it's going to help to clear those plugged follicles. And the same product that you use on your face, which for me is going to be the Flash Mask, you can use on your body. Number 2 is a body moisturizer that does more than just moisturize, and I'm talking about moisturizers with, for example, urea. This is found in products like the ISDIN Uridin-10 that helps to hydrate your skin while also softening keratin buildup, which will help to smooth your skin texture over time. Now, another option for these bumps are retinols, which you can find over the counter, or quite frankly, prescription tretinoids such as tretinoin, like Altrino, which I used to have here. I do not know where it is. It is a prescription. Here, and you can use this on your body. And guess what? Your body will take this better than your face because it will— is a little bit firmer and thicker, the skin on your arms and your legs, that you can actually probably do this almost every night. Now, the last tip I have for keratosis pilaris is actually laser hair removal. That can help with the overall appearance of it because it is a keratin plug within a hair follicle. When you shut that hair follicle down, it minimizes the reactivity of the hair follicle itself and in the process can help with the look of the redness and the texture. And this is something that I've done for my patients in office that has worked quite well. And again, if you can't afford an office treatment, you can try laser at-home devices as long as you are the right skin tone and you have not been exposed to the sun. Mistake number 3 is to ignore treatments for your body or your butt acne. Now, this is nothing to be ashamed of, and so many people struggle with backne and buttne every single spring. And it tends to flare up more in the spring and summer because of the same reasons why you would flare up on your face, especially around your hairline if you wear baseball caps. But heat, occlusion, sweat, friction, tighter clothing— they all contribute to acne on your body, and they all cause clogged follicles, which can worsen the inflammatory process and make acne look worse. So there's a few common triggers that people also don't realize are triggering this other than just heat. One is your hair products. Certain hair conditioners, for example, as they run down your back in the shower, can clog your follicles even more so. And that's why I usually recommend using your body wash and your cleansers after you've washed your hair to get any of that residue off of your back or your chest. Number 2 are heavy body lotions or oils in acne-prone areas. If you are somebody who sweats a lot over here on your back, but you love to moisturize because your arms and your legs are dry, just focus on your arms and legs. You don't have to moisturize every nook and cranny and crevice and crevasse of your body. Okay, number 4, tight workout clothing that can trap heat. And this one married to number 5, I think, or 4, I can't remember the numbers, is not showering immediately after you work out and staying in those tight clothing in confined spaces with the sweat trapped in. It's just not a good look. So what works better is utilizing targeted treatments instead of just a simple body wash. So for example, you can use a benzoyl peroxide face wash on your back, on your butt, to help to reduce acne-causing bacteria. After you're done showering, you can exfoliate your body much more rapidly, especially if you are someone who sweats a lot and who's very oily, with a salicylic acid body spray. So unlike KP, which would really benefit from glycolic acid, if you are struggling from buttne and backne or chest acne, salicylic acid is probably going to work best for you because of the oil production, and salicylic acid loves oil. There are body sprays that I will link below that can help to prevent new breakouts. Another one is Hibiclens. This is one that we use prior to surgery, but you can use it as long as you're using it chest down. You're fine for buttne especially. But the only warning with Hibiclens is do not get it in your eyes or ears as you're washing your body because that can lead to unwanted long-term side effects, autotoxicity, etc., etc. And sometimes the fix is behavioral. Okay, so shower after sweating, like I said, use a body wash after using a conditioner or a shampoo or shampoo and conditioner. Change out of your workout clothes quickly, even though you want to stay in athleisure, just get out of the sweaty clothes if you have just sweat in them. Which leads me to the bathroom, and mistake number 4 is not changing your towels enough. Now, this is an important behavioral tip. A lot of people don't think about how often they're changing their towels, and they use the same towel for far too long. But if towels stay warm and damp over a long period of time, it creates the perfect environment to harbor mold, yeast, bacteria, and fungus to grow, which once you keep using it can cause other issues on your body like tinea corporis, which is a fungus on the skin, to tinea versicolor, to pityrosporum folliculitis, fungal acne. And so that's not something that you want to to attract or to cause onto yourself. So I would make sure that you are changing your towels, I would say, twice a week, um, to really make sure that you are utilizing— maybe that you're utilizing them for every— you're changing them every 2 to 3 washes, etc. Now for the face, I recommend getting 7 small face towels, and at the end of the day when you wash your face, you wash your face and you dry it with a NuFace towel, and you pop that baby into the hamper. And once a week you do the laundry, you get 7 fresh towels every week to dry your face with. Um, which leads me to the last mistake that I often see people make as the temperatures go up: sunscreen. Now I'm not going to make this boring, like, okay, you need to keep reapplying sunscreen. We all know you need to be reapplying sunscreen, but it's not just reapplying it stupidly all over your body, because guess what? No one is going to dip their bodies from head to toe in sunscreen, especially if they're not at the beach, and we're living busy lives. So I want to talk about things you can do to protect your skin realistically. Number 1, think about what you're wearing. If we're walking around in tank tops, then yes, you want to cover your face, neck, chest, your shoulders, your arms, your hands, etc. The exposed parts of your body, especially if you're going to be spending the day outside. And let's say you're wearing shorts, then guess what? You probably do want to apply sunscreen on your lower legs and on your legs. A very interesting fact and statistic is that women tend to get skin cancer on their legs compared to men who get it on their backs because women tend to cover their legs all winter and show their legs more in the summer, leading to more burns on their legs, which can lead to higher risks of skin cancer. So when you are applying sunscreen and if you are somebody who's wearing, for example, a lot of sandals or flip-flops, Make sure to apply it to the tops of your feet, not just on your legs, but the ankles especially is a very vulnerable area. Now, other spots that people often miss: the top of the ears. That's a huge one where skin cancer often appears. The edges of the nose right over here, the back of the neck, the top of the hands, which is also another big one, but we want to stay looking nice and fresh and vibrant. And one place where I am embarrassed to say, but my own daughter got a burn, is the top of the head. So unless you are wearing a baseball cap or a hat or something that's covering your scalp, make sure to use some sunscreen spray on the top of your scalp. Reapplication obviously matters, especially if you are at the beach and you're jumping in and out of the water. If you are living in a city and you are working indoors, not by a window, applying it once in the morning is more than enough. If you are inside between 10 AM and 4 PM. But if you are going to be out and about, you probably want to reapply once midday. And by the way, there are other ways that you can protect yourselves, and it's not just through sunscreen. It is UV visor season, baby, and UV visors are my jam. If you're going to be wearing sunglasses, make sure they have UVA/UVB protection. That's pretty much what the visor is. You can also use rash guards. That are going to protect your skin physically, um, with a physical delineator, aka the rash guard, from the sun. And they're not heavy, and they're very breathable, and they are quite enjoyable to wear when you find the right one for you. Um, so it doesn't have to be so complicated. I hope this video was helpful. I hope you guys learned a thing or two from laser hair removal to KP to acne to changing your towels to even sunscreen application. And I hope you guys have a beautiful Saturday, and I will see you all next week. Please leave your questions, comments, concerns in the comment section below. Have a beautiful Saturday.
