From scorching temperatures and harmful UV exposure, to dirt and pollution in the air, the skin on your face goes through a lot, day in and day out. Not only that, but the food and drinks we consume, alongside various beauty products we use – can all impact our skin health. That’s why we often need to give it a helping hand and a cryotherapy facial may be just the thing to assist us in restoring it. Here are the surprising benefits of a cryo facial.
What is a Cryotherapy Facial?
Cryotherapy is a treatment that involves subjecting the body to extremely cold temperatures. This encourages a number of bodily functions, as well as providing various benefits – such as improving sports recovery and boosting the immune system.
As for a cryotherapy facial, it’s nothing like the full body treatment. You won’t have to stand in a chamber for three minutes – instead, air that’s been cooled to a sub-zero temperature is sprayed onto your face.
How Does Cryotherapy Help Your Skin?
Ups the Collagen Production
Studies have proven that cryotherapy encourages collagen production. Collagen is a protein that helps to keep your skin firm, supple and elastic. As you age, collagen levels naturally decrease and your skin becomes drier – causing lines and wrinkles to form. Collagen-boosting beauty concoctions, such as creams, supplements and even injections, are becoming increasingly popular to mitigate this.
Although injections can give you an immediate effect, they can be expensive, and creams and supplements may take a while to take effect. Plus, they can be quite harsh on the skin. On the other hand, cryotherapy is gentle and much more successful.
Reduces Appearance of Wrinkles & Lines
Cryotherapy stimulates the production of collagen, allowing your skin to remain firm and plump for longer. While traditional remedies such as botox and herbal supplements may also reduce wrinkles, cryotherapy is a much more effective and gentler form of treatment.
Reduces Pigmentation & Inflammation
Pigmentation, such as age spots, acne, sun damage and puffiness, can be difficult to treat and conceal. Creams and facial treatments may help, however, cryotherapy can flush the body of metabolic waste, as well as substitute dead skin cells with new ones – this in turn helps your skin appear more even.
Gives Your Skin a Radiance
When you’re exposed to cryotherapy, your body’s instinct is to redirect a lot of your blood flow to the core organs, in an attempt to maintain your internal body temperature. When the session is done, and the temperature is brought back to normal – nutrient-filled blood rushes back to your extremities, including your face. This allows your skin to ‘refresh’ and leaves you with a glowing complexion.
Minimises Pores
We are aware that heat can help to open up our pores – that’s why many people wash their face with hot water to give their skin a thorough clean. On the other hand, cryotherapy can help to reduce their size and stop them from blocking.
As we mentioned earlier, this is linked to how cryotherapy increases the production of collagen. By tightening the skin, it also minimises the size of your pores.
Improves Chronic Skin Conditions
Cryotherapy has been known to relieve symptoms of eczema, psoriasis and dermatitis – including redness and itchiness. It can also help treat acne, by stimulating blood circulation so nutrient and waste exchange between cells functions faster. When exposed to the cold temperature, blood is directed to the core organs. When your body warms back up, blood rushes everywhere – bringing with it new nutrients and taking away any metabolic waste from the cells – aiding in their healing.
How is a Cryo Facial Different From a Normal Facial?
Reading about the benefits of cryotherapy may have you thinking ‘they sound quite similar to a traditional facial’ – and you’d be right, however, what distinguishes a cryo facial from a normal facial?
While an average facial helps to cleanse, restore and nourish the skin, it is often a multi-step process. It involves steaming, applying a face mask, washing it off, exfoliating, cleansing and toning – and that’s before you even get to moisturising and face massaging. This process can often take a while – however, a cryotherapy facial allows you to pick from a variety of treatments that range from three minutes to one hour. You can also choose the shorter treatments and still get the same results, without harsh, chemical creams and supplements.
Want to Find Out More About Cryotherapy & Its Benefits?
Cryotherapy facials are just one of the ways we can use cryotherapy to benefit our body – and the skin isn’t the only thing that can benefit. For more information about how cryotherapy can help reduce the signs of ageing, improve recovery, boost the immune system and more – head over to our blog and have a read.
