About Eye Cream

The skin around the eyes is very thin and delicate and subject to wrinkling from a variety of reasons. Laugh lines, squinting, rubbing the eye area to remove mascara, salty tears--which dry out skin--all take their toll. It is therefore important to pay special attention to that area. One way to do that is by using eye cream.

Significance

Eye cream is formulated especially for this delicate skin surrounding the eye; however, according to Margaret Hardy from Good Housekeeping, you could use regular moisturizer there as long as it does not irritate. However, a tiny fraction of cream will probably end up in your eye through the cream's contact with your eyelashes.

Prevention/Solution

Three problems plague the under-eye area: wrinkles, puffiness and dark circles. The latter two are mostly remedied by products that stimulate circulation, particularly, as stated in Good Housekeeping, "peptides, chrysin, sodium hyaluronate, rosehip seed oil, alpha lipoic acid, hespiridin, glutathione," oils like olive oil, acai oil, jojoba oil, and vitamins.

Ingredients

For wrinkle treatment, the ingredients should ideally be natural botanicals, but one synthetic product called Argireline is in a category of its own. Argireline, according to the National Institutes of Health, is a nontoxic, antiwrinkle peptide that is a safe alternative to the neurotoxin botox. A skin topography analysis of an oil/water emulsion containing 10 percent of Argireline reduced wrinkle depth up to 30 percent after a 30-day treatment, according to the NIH

Considerations

What works best, in Hardy's words, is a "two-or three-prong approach.": an oil-based serum for hydration and smoothing out wrinkles along with a cream for the night. You apply a lot of it and let it sink into your skin while you sleep. During the day, you use creamy serums and creams that are particularly good at smoothing out the eye area. Beware of any cream containing mineral oils--it can cause white bumps to form under the skin.

Alternatives

Plain oils work very well for the delicate under-eye area, such as apricot kernel oil, grape seed oil and sweet almond oil. All of them are light and very moisturizing. Borage oil is excellent for mature, aging skin or extremely dry skin. You can purchase these oils and similar ones at your local health food store for a fraction of the cost of an eye cream.