UAE | Health
Expert warns teenagers of early skin damage
Skin damage is happening earlier in teenage life, according to a Dubai dermatologist.
- By Alice Johnson, Staff Reporter
- Published: 23:53 May 23, 2008
- Sunburn and prolonged exposure to the sun in early years can lead to damaged skin and increase the chances of skin cancer in later life.
- Image Credit:
Dubai: Skin damage is happening earlier in teenage life, according to a Dubai dermatologist.
Sunburn and prolonged exposure to the sun in early years can lead to damaged skin and increase the chances of skin cancer in later life.
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Dr Ekram Allah Al Nasir, dermatologist and medical director, Dermacare, said: "What is concerning to me is that I'm seeing people with damage in their 20s and 30s. Perhaps younger people are engaging in risky activities now - where before the skin damage was done at age 20, now it is done maybe at the age of 14 or 15. It's very much because of lifestyle change and early 'maturity' and you can see independent behaviour increasingly in the youth," he said.
According to the World Health Organisation, currently one in five North Americans and one in two Australians will develop some form of skin cancer in their lifetime.
Sun exposure during childhood and adolescence appears to set the stage for the development of skin cancers in later life, with a significant part of a person's lifetime exposure occurring before the age of 18, according to the authority.
Al Nasir continued that, generally speaking, the risk of skin cancer increases after the mid-40s.
"In the long-term, the habits you adopt in mid- to late-teens determine health outcomes in your 40s and 50s. Now we see patients of all age groups with a potential risk of skin cancer in the mid-30s, 40s and 50s. This is cumulative damage after 20-40 years of exposure to the sun."
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