Apple Bodemer MD’01 wants you to save your skin. “It’s a topic I’m passionate about,” she says. “I always love being able to spread more information.”
Bodemer has been a dermatologist for more than 20 years, and she’s been on the UW faculty for 16. “In my book, [UW dermatology] is the best,” she says. She also serves as section chief for dermatology at Madison’s VA hospital. When she talks about skin health, she knows her business, so Badger Insider sought her advice for how to keep safe in the sun.
Why is sun protection important?
Skin cancer is the main thing that people think about [regarding sun protection], but UV radiation also dramatically accelerates the aging process. It thins the skin and the tissues that support the skin, including blood vessels. Down the road, this can lead to solar purpura, where people bump their arms and bleed really easily. And, of course, [it causes] wrinkling, for sure.
For the young, this is a danger, but are older people in the clear? If their skin is okay, can they stop worrying?
There’s about a 20-to-40-year lag between when sun damage happens and when we start to see problems on the skin. Some people will say, “Oh, I’m 75, I don’t care.” But if you’ve already got some cancerous cells that are brewing underneath the surface, every amount of UV radiation is a clock that just keeps ticking. Once you start getting a few mutated cells, the more times you hit them with that UV radiation, the faster they’re going to continue to mutate, and the faster they’re going to recruit other cells.
What’s the most important thing people can do to protect their skin from sun damage?
Avoid the midday sun. In the hours between 10 and four, when the sun is at peak intensity, look for shade. Protective clothing is something that I’m a big fan of. Look for something that says it has a UPF of 50. That tells you that only one-fiftieth of the sunlight that hits the surface of that clothing is going to get through to your skin.
What’s the difference between UPF and SPF?
UPF is looking at how much sunlight is getting passed through the fabric. SPF measures how quickly you turn red in the sun. SPF really only measures UVB exposure because UVB is what causes us to burn. We don’t have a good way of measuring UVA exposure. That’s the main difference. [In] sunscreens, you want to have ingredients that protect against both UVA and UVB, but we really don’t have a good way of measuring how much UVA is getting through.
What do you recommend for sunscreen?
There are physical blockers and chemical blockers. The physical blockers are the safest. Several of the chemical blockers are known to be endocrine disruptors, meaning that they mess with our hormones and they get absorbed to a significant degree. They’re also not really good for the environment. When I recommend sunscreens for my patients, friends, [or] family members, [I] look for something that’s either got zinc oxide, titanium dioxide, or both.
How much should a person use?
In order to put the amount on that’s used in the studies that determine SPF factor, you need to use about a palm full to cover a body in a bathing suit. That’s usually about an ounce or two. A six-ounce bottle of sunscreen should not last you all summer. Also, no matter what SPF you’re using, it wears off within two hours. It needs to be reapplied every two hours or after you get wet, because if you put your sunscreen on, you go in the pool, you get out, wrap yourself up in a towel, all that sunscreen has gone in the water and on the towel. Even waterproof sunscreen gets rubbed off.
