Understanding Fat Intake as a Contributor to Healthy Skin

Healthy skin, that is blem­ish free and reg­u­larly exhibits a vibrant com­plex­ion, is about more than the exter­nal appli­ca­tion of top­i­cal prod­ucts.

In fact, the health of your body’s biggest organ starts on the inside and is influ­enced by sev­eral fac­tors, includ­ing intake of healthy fats, gut health and micro­biota sta­tus, as well as your exter­nal liv­ing envi­ron­ment.

Understanding the role each of these plays and how to max­i­mize their pos­i­tive influ­ence is the key to healthy, glow­ing skin.

The anatom­i­cal make-up of the skin, join­ing its acces­sory struc­tures to con­sti­tute the body’s integu­men­tary sys­tem, is a series of lay­ers, which act as a pro­tec­tive bar­rier to the inter­nal ele­ments and organs of the body. The der­mis layer of the skin con­tains a series of blood ves­sels, lymph ves­sels, hair fol­li­cles and sweat glands, many of which act as exit paths or pores from inside the body. The body’s nat­ural meth­ods of detox­i­fi­ca­tion send flu­ids and waste out through these pores to the exter­nal envi­ron­ment to be elim­i­nated.

Keeping the pores and skin func­tion­ing opti­mally is influ­enced by sev­eral fac­tors, and fail­ure to max­i­mize the effec­tive­ness of each of these can lead to acne, break­outs, dry skin and over­all poor com­plex­ion.

One of the main fac­tors that play a role in healthy skin is diet and nutri­tion. Many stud­ies have shown the inter­sec­tion between gut health and healthy skin, exam­in­ing the influ­ence of pro­bi­otics and pre­bi­otics in opti­miz­ing skin health via the absence of skin con­di­tions.

Most of the work of pre­bi­otics and pro­bi­otics comes from their abil­ity to mod­u­late the immune sys­tem, whereby they can pro­duce anti-micro­bial pep­tides which fight pathogens. Furthermore, the skin itself is made up of mil­lions of microbes. Consuming ade­quate microbes in our diet is essen­tial to replen­ish the skin micro­biota and help ensure it remains in an opti­mal bal­ance.

The argu­ment for diet, how­ever, goes beyond sim­ply con­sum­ing gut-healthy foods and also addresses the role of healthy fats and other macro and micronu­tri­ents in our diet and how these impact the health of our skin.

A study look­ing at the inter­sec­tion of diet and acne found sup­port in improv­ing skin health through the con­sump­tion of omega‑3 and omega‑6 fatty acids. Known as the essen­tial fatty acids (EFAs), due to the body’s inabil­ity to make them inter­nally, these have strong anti-inflam­ma­tory prop­er­ties, play­ing a key role in secret­ing the desir­able prostaglandins within the body. Prostaglandins are hor­mone-like sub­stances that can dic­tate actions to be taken by spe­cific organs and spe­cific path­ways.

When you reduce inflam­ma­tion in the body, through ade­quate intake of EFAs, you opti­mize skin health by increas­ing the body’s amount of linoleic acid. This nutri­ent is a pre-cur­sor to EFA extrac­tion and indi­vid­u­als who suf­fer from acne have been shown to be defi­cient in linolenic acid, indi­cat­ing it is an essen­tial com­po­nent of the body’s path­way to gen­er­at­ing nor­mal­ized skin cells. In addi­tion, fur­ther stud­ies have shown that inter­ven­tion with dietary lipids in those who are show­ing signs of skin irri­ta­tion, can prove to be an effec­tive treat­ment.

Obtaining ade­quate EFAs through diet is made very acces­si­ble through things such as fish, flaxseed and olive oil. Rich in Omega 6 and Omega 3, olive oil is a great plant-based oil selec­tion to increase your intake of anti-inflam­ma­tory pro­mot­ing fats, espe­cially valu­able given that for many peo­ple, fish may not be a food they choose to eat reg­u­larly.

But if you are con­sum­ing lots of olive oil, dili­gently work­ing to main­tain a healthy gut, and still find­ing your­self fac­ing down unhealthy skin, here is one other fac­tor which may be to blame: your liv­ing sit­u­a­tion. That’s right, your cohab­i­tants just might be caus­ing your acne.

A recent study showed that house­hold occu­pancy is asso­ci­ated with changes in the skin micro­biota.

The first of its kind, the study inves­ti­gated the rela­tion­ship between the micro­bial envi­ron­ment of the res­i­dent, his/her co-habi­tants and other non-cohab­i­tants, look­ing at how these phys­i­cal human inter­ac­tions or non-inter­ac­tions could affect skin health. They showed that house­hold occu­pancy is cor­re­lated with cer­tain types of bac­te­ria and the changes in bac­te­r­ial diver­sity within the skin, and that can lead to both a pos­i­tive and neg­a­tive impact on the res­i­dent.

While fur­ther research is required to spec­ify how to directly ensure the effect of cohab­i­tants is ben­e­fi­cial, and not the cause of skin out­breaks, the foun­da­tion of this research show­ing that there is an impact on our skin health based on our day to day human inter­ac­tions is fun­da­men­tal. It offers a great deal of room for expan­sion and fur­ther research as we seek to under­stand how to obtain and main­tain opti­mal skin health.

Whether through increased con­sump­tion of fat, improved cohab­i­tant rela­tion­ships or a more ded­i­cated effort towards max­i­miz­ing pre­bi­otic and pro­bi­otic based gut health, being cog­nizant of your skin con­di­tion and envi­ron­men­tal fac­tors, as well as your daily dietary pro­file, is the first step in work­ing to achieve opti­mal skin health.

• ScienceDirect


• Dermato Endrocrinology


• Micorbiome