Skin Care

Facial skin care, from the cleanser to the night cream:

most routines are built from the same few pieces. Cleansers come as gels and foams for oily skin, milks and balms for dry skin, and micellar water for anyone who wants make-up off without a rinse. A serum is the concentrated step, in a small dropper or pump bottle, and the most expensive part of a routine by the millilitre. Moisturisers split into day creams, heavier night creams and eye-contour creams in their own small tubes. Grainy scrubs, liquid exfoliants and clay or overnight masks get used a few times a week and often turn up nearly full. Hand and body lotions have their own shelf in body creams and lotions, and anything for sun protection or a fake tan sits in sunscreen and self-tanners.

Gel, gel-cream or cream on the label:

texture is the choice that matters most and the one people most often get wrong. Gel and gel-cream moisturisers sink in fast and suit oily and combination skin; rich creams and balms suit dry skin and feel heavy on anyone else. The box says which skin type a product is made for, and oil-free or non-comedogenic on the label is worth looking for if your skin breaks out easily. Fragrance-free is the safer pick for sensitive skin, and for anything you cannot smell before you buy it. Start with a cleanser, a moisturiser and sunscreen, then add one serum at a time, so that if something does not suit you, you know which piece it was.

The pharmacy counter, the supermarket shelf and the clinic kit:

a gel moisturiser from a supermarket line costs about $10 to $12 in Panama, while the dermocosmetic lines on the pharmacy counter ask $30 to $40 for a jar the same size, and a regimen put together by a dermatology clinic and sold as a kit of several steps can pass $150. That spread is why sealed pharmacy and clinic products are worth listing and supermarket ones rarely are. Once opened, any of them loses most of its value at once, because the buyer cannot know how it was kept. The exception is a clinic kit with most of its steps still sealed, which is priced on those closed pieces.

Lot codes on the crimp and a cream that has turned:

start with the packaging. A sealed tube carries its lot number and date pressed into the crimped end, and a jar or bottle carries them on the base; pump and dropper bottles often have a foil or plastic seal under the cap. Then the contents. A cream that has split into oil and water, gone grainy or watery, darkened, or smells like old cooking oil has turned, whatever the date says. Copies of the best-known pharmacy lines circulate with slightly smudged print and boxes in thinner card than the original, so compare with the maker’s own product photos. Sachet samples and travel minis are fine as extras, never as the reason for the trip: nobody can see inside a sachet.

Half a regimen in the bathroom cabinet:

list each piece on its own unless it belongs to a clinic kit, with the full product name and size as printed on the box. Photograph the crimp or the base with the lot and date legible, and hold a clear or dropper bottle up to the light so the level shows. Say when you opened it, roughly how many times you used it and why you stopped: too heavy, a scent you did not like, a routine you cut down. For a clinic kit, say which steps are sealed and which are open, and include the leaflet that came with it. Someone coming from Costa del Este for a clinic kit will turn every tube over to read the crimp before paying, so bring it in its original box with the steps in order.