Some health tips for the summer
Here’s a true-or-false question from the Grossmont College
campus. If you have dark skin, you still
need sun screen.
It’s true, says incoming nursing student Tiffany Gans-Lewis, who recently volunteered at Griffin Center to
teach students about protecting their skin from the summer sun’s rays.
“It doesn’t matter what skin tone you are,” she said. “Everyone needs to wear a minimum of at least
30 SPF (Sun Protection Factor.) Although
people with fair skin tend to burn most easily, all skin tones are at risk.
“There are a couple of tips when you are applying sunscreen,” the nursing
student told passersby at the student center.
“You want to apply it at least 15 minutes before you go out in the sun
and you should reapply it two hours afterwards, because it does wear off. And when you are applying it to your body,
you should actually use the equivalent of a shot glass full of it on your skin,
and at least a teaspoon of it on your face.”
Lewis, who holds a bachelor’s degree, has returned to student life after six
years as a social worker in order to study in Grossmont College’s two-year
program to become a Registered Nurse.
She says that she wears sun screen all the time, not only on her face but on
her “arms, ears, toes.”
“I am particularly concerned because my mom is a survivor of skin cancer, so
that is why I volunteered to staff this table,” she said. “For me, this is a subject close to home. I have been protecting myself from the sun
for years. I have kids, and I put sun
screen on my kids like crazy. I lather
them up. They are darker than I am and
the go out of the house looking like ghosts.
But people should protect their kids too because skin problems can start
at a very early age.
Another myth about the sun, she said, “is people think that if they only go out
in the sun for five minutes, they don’t need protection. But really they do
need it because the UV (ultraviolent) rays are so strong, they can damage skin
within five minutes.”
Similarly, she said, people need to apply sun screen even on cloudy days.
At her information table, Gans-Lewis gave away packages with little towels
inside that are suffused with sun Sunx30 screen lotion. “They’re great,” she said, “because a guy can
carry them in his pocket or a gal in her purse, and if you don’t have your
bottle of sunscreen, you can just towel it on."
She noted that among the first 23
people who stopped at her table, only four had actually applied sun screen
before going out that morning, and 19 had not used any.
Some of her other tips for staying healthy during the hot summer months
included:
1. Drink lots of water to make sure that
you are hydrated.
2. Stay in the shade
3. Wear a hat
4. Wear protective clothing like long
sleeves and pants, even though it may be hot out.
5. Wear sunglasses
6. Keep food safe from spoiling by
storing at the right temperatures (40 degrees F.)
--DHH