Tips to Help Soothe and Heal Sun-Injured Skin

Sunburn treatment always starts with sunburn prevention.

In severe cases, urgent medical care may be needed.

What Is a Sunburn?

Applying healing ointment on a sunburn

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Certainphotosensitizing drugscan also increase your risk.

Nausea, fever, chills, and fainting may also occur if the sunburn is severe.

Peeling may commence within three to eight days and continue for several weeks in some cases.

Second-Degree Sunburn

Sunburns rarely develop into third-degree burns, but bothfirst-degreeandsecond-degreesunburns are common.

Second-degree sunburns are concerning because they tend to involve larger portions of the body.

How to Treat Sunburn

The first step to treating a sunburn is recognizing the symptoms.

The moment that skin redness develops, cover up and get out of the sun.

Sunburns not onlyage skin cellsbut increase the risk ofsolar lentigo(“liver spots”) and skin cancer.

Reapply sunscreen every two to three hours or after swimming or heavy perspiration.

A high-SPF lip balm is also useful.

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Thompson, A.Suntan and Sunburn.JAMA.2015;314(6):638. doi:10.1001/jama.2015.8045.