There’s a common skin disorder that can occur in middle-aged people with celtic ancestry. Its Rosacea (pronounced ‘roh-ZAY-sha’). Often appearing on the face, this condition tends to occur more frequently in fair-skinned people who blush easily – that’s why its known as ‘The Curse Of The Celts’.

 

The underlying problem is chronic inflammation, possibly caused by leaky blood vessels underneath the skin. It often appears first with blushing and a sense of heat in the face that is not necessarily caused by embarrassment. As the disorder progresses blushing occurs more frequently, eventually becoming a permanent redness. The inflammation continues, skin thickens, and may develop a coarse appearance, sometimes with enlarged pores and acne-like bumpiness. The eye area may be involved too, bringing on itching, burning, watery eyes.

 

Once you understand how your body treats inflammation, its easy to see why skin conditions become more difficult to resolve the longer they’ve been there. In acute inflammation, such as when you graze your skin, blood vessels in the area immediately dilate to deliver more blood, along with immune cells and blood clotting materials. The area becomes red and swells as blood vessels deliberately become ‘leaky’ to allow healing materials into the surrounding tissues. Ideally the healing progresses well and skin colour returns to normal.

 

If skin irritation continues, or healing doesn’t happen, your body attempts to compensate. New blood vessels are built in the area to deliver more healing materials, but this just creates more redness. Blood vessels and skin cells become thicker; new, larger immune cells move into the area, and the inflamed area may even be deliberately ‘walled off’ with fibrosis if it seems that the inflammation can’t be cleared away. The longer the inflammation remains, the more work your body has to do to return the tissue to normal. This is why its better to treat skin problems as soon as they appear.

 

With Rosacea, some people can identify triggers that bring on the redness and heat. Triggers vary between individuals, but commonly reported ones are emotional stress, and hot weather. Some people find that gastrointestinal symptoms can trigger the ‘flush and blush’ of Rosacea, although no specific food group has been identified as a cause.

 

Naturopathic treatment of Rosacea centers around calming the underlying inflammation, plus reducing the effect of any identified triggers, particularly emotional stress. Just having Rosacea can create even more stress, as facial skin becomes red, bumpy and thick; this just makes the problem worse, so stress management and calming remedies are part of natural treatment of this condition.

 

Good, natural treatments are available, so if you have Rosacea remember that help is available!

 

 

 

Article © Olwen Anderson, 2008

Rosacea—Curse Of The Celts