How Tretinoin Reduces Wrinkles & Sun Spots

As we age, our skin cells are exposed to sunlight and air longer, causing greater effects of photoaging—the process through which your skin starts to develop fine lines, wrinkles, sun spots, and other visible signs of aging.

“Exposure to the ultraviolet rays of the sun causes aging of the skin,” Dr. Sylvia S. Jacinto says, citing as an example that a senior citizen who plays golf regularly would typically have a dark complexion and wrinkled face and arms that are darker than the trunk, but the buttocks are like a baby’s skin: fair and smooth with no wrinkles or dark spots.

The same is true of men and women who go outdoors a lot without the protection provided by a sunscreen lotion. Jacinto recommends applying SPF exposed to the sun, whatever your age.

But inevitably, as time goes on, the years take their toll on our skin despite the regular use of sunscreen.

Dr. Jacinto says that’s where tretinoin comes in. A topical tretinoin prescription is used to treat wrinkles, dark spots or rough skin caused by the damaging rays of the sun. Tretinoin works by speeding up your body’s production of new skin cells, letting you replace old skin with new skin faster. In turn, this slows down and reverses those signs aging.

Tretinoin use treats fine lines and wrinkles, brightens the complexion, and fades dark spots left by acne or sun damage. Because tretinoin is already a retinoic acid, it directly affects the skin. This allows you to potentially see improvement of the skin in six to eight weeks time.

Tretinoin is widely studied and has been proved to be a very effective anti-aging treatment that reverses wrinkles and sun damage. In one study, participants were divided into two groups, one of which received non-prescription skincare products, and the other a 0.02% tretinoin cream in addition to moisturizing sunscreen. Over the course of eight weeks, participants in the tretinoin group saw a significant reduction in facial skin aging, with lower eye area wrinkle fraction, and an improvement in overall skin appearance after the treatment.

Another huge bonus of using tretinoin is that it reduces the risk of skin cancer. Tretinoin does reduce some signs of skin aging associated with chronic sun exposure. Used with topical DNA repair enzymes, it may help treat actinic keratoses and prevent basalcell and squamous cell carcinomas.