Skin As A Protective Organ

Now you know why you should not scrub off the top dead layer aggressively. Also do not wash your skin too many times or you may one, strip all the natural secretions and two, trigger a feedback from the skin when it is super dry and cause the oil glands to over-secrete. Excessive skin peeling treatments make the skin more vulnerable to damage. Especially avoid those treatments that rip your outer dead skin layer off before you go on a sunny or a beach holiday.
Skin also acts as a barrier against water loss. Trans-epidermal water loss is water that passes from your deeper tissues through the epidermal layer to the surrounding atmosphere via diffusion and evaporation process. The water loss from the skin is affected by the level of humidity, temperature, weather, and your skin’s natural moisture content.
This is a continuous process over which we have little control. It can increase due to disruption to the skin barrier due to wounds, scratches, burns, or exposure to harsh surfactants. This leads to extreme dryness of the skin. Disturbance in any layer of the skin causes a loss of water from the skin.
The stratum corneum has 30% water which is associated with elasticity of the outer layer of the skin. The innermost layer of the stratum corneum has the maximum percentage of water that supports the outer layer. The moisture on the outermost layer of the skin is dependent on the ambient humidity.
Thirdly, the skin is your biggest immune guard that keeps you safe from infections. But when you have chapped skin or cuts, you have to be extra careful. This is especially important during the monsoon months when there is higher humidity and more chances of bacteria to grow. So keep your skin clean and dry, yet hydrated as well.
But there is a flip side to this. Since the skin forms a protective barrier, the lotions that you apply play a major role in the kind of protection offered to your skin. You have to choose products from skincare companies that are research-oriented because they use the right vehicles, right version of the actives (key ingredients or ingredients that give you the desired result), and the appropriate molecular size to deliver the ingredients into the skin through the top layer.