Products blog posts and news

95 Percent Of Dieters Regain Weight Within 1 To 5 Years

While it's encouraging that weight gain in the US has leveled off, the place where we're landing is firmly at overweight. To get our collective weight down, we face long odds.  The food industry doesn't want us to reduce our eating, and the diet industry is a money pit. Plainly, diets don't work. We spend something like $40 billion each year on diets, with just five out of 100 dieters keeping weight off.

Food is manufactured so we will reach our 'bliss point'

Working against our weight-loss goals is a food industry that has us wired to eat.

In a new book, The End of Overeating: Taking Control of the Insatiable American Appetite, former FDA head Dr. David Kessler exposes the degree to which scientists formulate foods -- sold in grocery stores and restaurants -- to get us to eat more.

"Restaurants and food makers manipulate ingredients to reach the aptly named 'bliss point.' Foods that contain too little or too much sugar, fat or salt are either bland or overwhelming. But food scientists work hard to reach the precise point at which we derive the greatest pleasure from fat, sugar and salt." (Source: NYT)

We're all being stimulated to eat more than we should!

» Read more

Miley To Fans: Shell Out For $100 Cleanser! Just Like Me!

It's enough for parents of teen (and younger) girls to spend their hard-earned cash on the rafts of Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus merch that flood the market. So imagine their agony when their little Miley-ites come to them and ask them to shell out for a $100 face cleanser.

But that's exactly what's about to happen, after MiCy pounded out a torrent of Tweets a couple days ago gushing about Kanebo's Sensai Silky Purifying Cleanser. To wit, emoticons and all:

sensai face wash step 1 and 2 has CHANGED my life

a beauty product can change your life! having acne is miserable :( you feel so insecure. :( i am so happy to have found sensai.

» Read more

Q&A Of The Day: How Much Does Latisse Cost?

In today's Q&A of the day, RealSelf user Miss Yates is looking for the answer to a question a lot of our community has been asking:

What's it going to cost me to get longer lashes with Latisse?

As Miss Yates found out, over 30 of our MDs chimed in, and the general consensus is that it's about $120 for a 60-day supply (at least that's what Allergan is suggesting).

Dr. Eric Joseph in West Orange, NJ says he's using a slightly different treatment regimen, so a $120 bottle will last you four months. And SF plastic surgeon Corey Maas, MD is offering it at cost -- $92 for a bottle. And the range (for various amounts) can veer between $72 and $150.

Wherever you get it, watch out for possible side effect that have been reported, as Dr. Arnold Oppenheim points out, including patients "having their blue eyes turn brown."

» Read more

Accutane Yanked For Good, Says Roche

A controversial era in acne treatment is over: Roche says it is taking extensively-used severe acne treatment Accutane off the market after almost three decades.

The company -- in its own statement, according to Bloomberg -- makes it sound like they're yanking it because its generic competitors are making it a financial loser, and though its market share is now below five percent, Roche has also had to shell out over $33 million in damages to former Accutane patients who have complained of inflammatory bowel disease from taking the drug.

Meanwhile, generic competitors like Sotret will stay on the market, and dermatologist Neil S. Goldberg, M.D., of Bronxville, NY, tells Global Medical News isotretinoin is still "a miracle drug" for acne.

Have you used Accutane? And will you continue now that its manufacturer is pulling it off the market? And will doctors continue to prescribe isotretinoin despite its many side effects?

More on RealSelf

• RealSelf users say Accutane has helped them more than 75% of the time.
• Have I become dependent on Accutane? Our doctors weigh in.

» Read more

Hairy Black Tongue? Maybe It's The Skin Condition Meds

You're about to read just about the best lead sentence in a medical trade mag -- in any mag, for that matter -- we've ever seen:

Bent penis, black hairy tongue, ear ringing, nightmares and psoriasis are just some of the rare side effects of drugs commonly prescribed by dermatologists and other physicians.

So says Dermatology Times, which got this tremendous bit of scoop from dermatologist Jerome Z. Litt, M.D., of Beachwood, Ohio.

Litt's been writing and updating the Drug Eruption Reference Manual for the past 15 years, and he's compiled some of the more bizarre (and disturbing) side effects of taking derm drugs in a new book, Curious, Odd, Rare, and Abnormal Reactions to Medications.

Most of the freaky reactions described in Dr. Litt's book emanate (on rare occasions, we must stress) from antibiotics, methotrexate, and other powerful drugs prescribed for skin conditions.

» Read more

Fragrance That Makes You Smell Younger. Just A Fantasy?

Ageless Fantasy is a new $120 a bottle perfume that claims to make you smell nearly a decade younger. 

From the copywriters at Harvey Prince:

Patent-pending Ageless Fantasy was engineered to make you smell younger. No other product available today offers this technology. Research proves that men around women who used the perfume thought they were on an average 8 years younger! The Essence of Youth, this precious youth elixir is a blend of pink grapefruit, mango, anti-oxidant rich pomegranate, jasmine and musk.

Sure does smell like a "fantasy," but their idea of a scent pyramid (image) is pretty cool.

Source: Canada.com

» Read more

Breast Pills And Creams: A Hoax That Carries Real Health Risks

Marketers offering breast enhancement or reduction solutions that promise results equivalent to surgery is an age old scam. 

Over 20 years ago the US FDA warned consumers, and especially teens, that breast enlargement alternatives to surgery were frauds.

"For decades, millions of dollars have been spent on devices, creams and lotions advertised as breast developers. All wasted. There is no device or system of exercise that will increase the size of the breasts. At best, devices promoted as breast developers merely strengthen and develop the muscles that support the breasts, and exercising these muscles will not appreciably increase breast size."

Breast experts agree: breast pills, herbs or creams don't work

"With Alexia, these problems will stop, WITHOUT painful surgery! And Permanently! With smaller and lighter breasts you’ll feel like you're walking on air!" - website advertising Alexia breast reducing pills

» Read more

Labels For Life: What’s In Your Make-up?

Earlier this week we came across an article in the Washington Post discussing a recent campaign launched by Tara Lee, founder of the site Best in Beauty. Labels For Life is a campaign that Lee started to help educate consumers on the toxic substances found in many beauty products on the shelves today.

The most recent arm of this effort was the “message on the mirror” campaign that made its way around Facebook and through email. The effort asked individuals to write a message to the FDA in lipstick, and to send a photo to Lee who is compiling these to deliver to the FDA. You can check some of these out on the site, along with some past ad campaigns.

So, is this something you really need to worry about?

Check out the 10 most common harmful ingredients found in everyday products. Mercury, lead and formaldehyde all make this list, which is a little disconcerting. While the levels of these ingredients are likely very small, when you think about the number of times you apply lipstick or face lotion over a lifetime, my guess is you might look a little closer at the ingredients of your favorite products next time you head to the drug store.

» Read more

Daily Skin Cleansing Using Clarisonic

If you’ve been cruising the cosmetic counters in search of  the dream cream that will work best with your skin, stop now. Chances are, you’re spending a lot on impulse buys when there's something better to try: prepping your skin with a hand-held cleansing brush. 

Daily Deep-Cleansing vs. Weekly Exfoliation

You know the benefits of exfoliation as a once-a-week (or at most a 2x/week) event. It not only helps slough off dead skin cells, it also helps clear the way for your skincare treatments to work most effectively. Now, imagine that benefit on a daily basis. That’s what hand-helds, like the Clarisonic Skincare Brush, can provide.

» Read more

Want Arbonne Ingredients? You'll Have To Work For It.

I've given up looking for the ingredients in Arbonne's NutriMinC RE9 REtaliate Wrinkle Filler.

I'm far from alone in this frustration.  Read this Arbonne post with over 16,000 reads to get a flavor of the complaints about Arbonne ingredient information.

Arbonne's ingredient listings feels out-of-place in this age of transparency and customer-centric marketing.  Arbonne makes consumers work to gain insight into the Arbonne product ingredients.

To get the ingredient list of any Arbonne product you must contact an Arbonne consultant.  Why does Arbonne make this an arduous process when  consumers are accustomed to Googling a product to get instant information?  To make a sale.

» Read more