Dr. Nithya Raghunath

Getting less sleep (less than 7 hours) has short term effects as well as long term issues. It immediately affects your face and eyes. Lack of sleep causes your blood vessels to dilate, giving you under eye dark circles. It also makes you look tired, sad, and certainly older. No wonder a sound night’s sleep is termed 'beauty sleep'.

Here are top 3 benefits of getting a beauty sleep-

1) Curbs wear and tear: Your skin, and your whole body, retire into recovery or repair mode while you are asleep. Your skin renews itself. New skin cells grow and replace older cells. It is more like restoring and rebalancing.

2) Does balancing act: Sleep time is also the time when all kinds of hormonal and metabolic changes happen in the body, including your skin. As you snooze, your body churns out human growth hormone — a crucial ingredient for collagen production, which keeps your skin supple. A lack of sleep can disrupt those processes and result in skin breakout like acne.

3) It's recovery time: When you're tired, blood doesn't flow efficiently. The good thing about the skin is that it recovers quickly. Get a good night's sleep tonight and tomorrow you will look refreshed. 7-9 hours of beauty rest nightly should do the trick.

So, don't compromise on your sleep and start taking adequate rest in the night.

Click on consult privately to ask me any follow-up questions on this.

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Premature greying usually is hereditary or due to stress and vitamin deficiencies esp calcium pantothenate deficiency.. Food Rich in protein like soy, lentils, sprouts, meats, liver, eggs along with biotin and selenium rich food like carrots, salmon, sardines, nuts cauliflower induce good hair growth as well as prevent further premature greying. Green leafy vegetables, salads fruits are helpful too. You can apply Altris gel daily once and take NO GREY Tablets daily once for three months.

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Next time you clean your toes observe for any whitish discolouration between the toes. If so then it is mostly due to fungal infection. You have to consult your dermatologist. If there are no skin lesions except for itching, you can dry your feet properly after washing them and dust some powder between the fingers and wear socks (cotton socks preferably). And it is also required to rule out diabetes.

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