Cellular renewal and repair are well-established marketing terms used by the cosmetics industry to sell skin-care products. Having the ability to generate healthy cell growth (in other words, the way that younger skin cells reproduce) is a claim many antiwrinkle and antiaging moisturizers make.
This idea of stimulating healthy cell growth definitely has some basis in scientific research, as I point out throughout this book. But the cosmetics industry distorts the concept of cellular renewal, turning it into a great deal of misinformation represented by overpriced products. Here are the facts about what it is possible to do for skin, regardless of the price tag on the product you are buying.
Essentially, any skin-care product that can protect skin from environmental stress (antioxidants and sunscreen), reinforce the epidermis (skin-identical ingredients), and help produce healthier skin cells (cell-communicating ingredients) can help encourage healthy cell production, generate healthier collagen and elastin, improve the skin’s immune response, and prevent cellular damage. When you add exfoliants to this mix to remove the unhealthy buildup of dead skin cells on the surface, you have a strategy that can truly make skin look as young as is possible, at least from the world of skin care.
Inasmuch as many things can help skin with cellular renewal and repair, that is still not the panacea the cosmetics industry makes it out to be. Even if women used every product being sold for anti-aging and fighting wrinkles, they could never deliver any of the extreme changes extolled on the labels.