Fear of bleaching – Jamaica Observer

While many Jamaicans continue to ignore medical warnings about the dangers of skin bleaching, health experts at May Pen Hospital in Clarendon say they are seeing an increase in the number of patients returning for treatment after surgery because their wounds are not healing.

According to nurse Sarekhi Sewell, when patients return to the hospital, examination by medical professionals often finds that some of them take longer to recover due to their unhealthy lifestyle habits such as skin bleaching.

“We have many patients who have been coming to the clinics for months because they need to have multiple operations. Their wounds do not heal because of their lifestyle choices. Many of them bleach, so skin health is not good. When they get stitches, it breaks down and it just doesn’t heal,” Sewell said Jamaica Observer.

Skin bleaching, the use of chemical substances or steroid creams to reduce the concentration of melanin in the skin and make it lighter, has been a burning issue in Jamaica and other countries for decades.

Locally, the practice has become deeply rooted among Jamaicans hoping to transform their dark complexions into a lighter shade in the belief that lighter skin could be their ticket to a better life.

Most Jamaicans who bleach their skin use over-the-counter creams, many of them imitations imported from abroad. Long-term use of one of the ingredients, hydroquinone, has long been linked to a disfiguring condition called ochronosis, which causes patchy darkening of the skin. Doctors say misuse of bleaching lotions has also left some people with a network of stretch marks on their faces, affects brain development, can cause kidney failure, trigger irritable behavior, memory loss and muscle weakness.

Dr. Wayne Wright, a junior general surgeon at May Pen Hospital, explained that during the skin lightening process, these steroid creams cause the layers of skin to break down and become thinner.

“It makes the skin much harder to deal with. It makes wounds much more devastating because after you put all those steroids on the skin, you can catch infections much more easily, so we see a lot of those [patients] They come in with fungus on their skin,” said Dr. Wright.

“The skin is simply thinner, so it tears much more easily and bleeds more. It just doesn’t heal as well as normal skin without the addition of steroids or bleach,” he said Sunday Observer.

General laparoscopic and bariatric surgeon Dr. Alfred Dawes agreed and said that skin bleaching had such serious consequences that he refused to operate on patients involved in the process.

“I have noticed that the steroids in the creams slow down immediately after surgery and prevent adequate wound healing. This puts patients who bleach their skin at a higher risk of developing wound infections,” said Dr. Dawes.

“What’s more, I’ve found that long-term bleaching destroys the dermis, the thicker part of the skin. It thins the wound significantly and you will find that when you close the wounds with the sutures, the sutures tear through the skin like wet tissue paper and therefore the wound healing and cosmetic results are poor,” he said Sunday Observer.

To reduce the post-operative medical complications arising from skin bleaching, Dr. Dawes allows patients to go six weeks to three months without bleaching before they can undergo surgery.

“The damage to the skin has already occurred, but if the wound is open because the stitches tear, the chances of infection and healing are at least not as bad as with active bleaching,” he explained.

He stressed the importance of educating Jamaicans about this reality, pointing out that many who practice skin bleaching never think about the long-term consequences.

In addition to skin lightening, Nurse Sewell said she has seen patients who smoke and drink have difficulty recovering from wounds.

“These are often men who go to parties, drink and smoke. “So if they have an accident and go to the hospital, their treatment is definitely affected because drinking and smoking don’t play well with antibiotics,” she said.

Sewell urged patients to be cautious about their lifestyle choices as they have far-reaching effects.

“We need to encourage patients to make lifestyle choices, not just for themselves, but also because of the impact it has on their family and the hospital. There are so many resources that we dedicate just to caring for these individuals in likely preventable incidents,” she said.

Dr. Derrick McDowell, an orthopedic surgeon and sports medicine specialist, also found that while smoking affects wound healing, it also affects bone healing.

“When you smoke, you absorb inhalants from the burning tobacco, which causes problems with circulation and blood flow, so you essentially become hypoxic, meaning the oxygen concentration in the healing area is very low and the bones need something Oxygen for healing. If you smoke, it affects wound healing, but also bone healing. Bones don’t heal if you smoke,” he told the Sunday Observer.

“If I have to have elective surgery and do bone surgery and the person is a smoker, I will not do it until the person stops smoking because the bone will not heal,” he stressed.

He also warned against being around people who smoke, noting that secondhand smoke has the same effect of delaying bone healing.