today in our live healthy segment we are
talking about Sun safety today is
officially after all the first day of
summer believe it or not even though
it's felt like summer for the last month
at least it seems so each year here in
the United States about 3.3 million
people are diagnosed with non melanoma
skin cancer
one in five Americans will be diagnosed
in their lifetime
the Sun is mostly of course to blame in
these cases joining me now is minute
clinic nurse practitioner with CBS and
Jennifer Hickman good morning thank you
for being here I do appreciate it
I I feel like I should invest in stock
in sunscreen because I'm constantly I
have very fair skin so to my children we
freckle we don't we burn and we don't
tan and we freckle help us if you can
parents navigate the sunscreen aisle on
what is best and what is kind of
overkill you know I mean how much SPF do
you really need for your kids so you
always want to go for a broad spectrum
and you can always find it on the labels
it will say broad spectrum that way that
covers for both UVA and UVB we started
with SPF using a simple 30 that's plenty
sufficient that's gonna block 97% of
your UVA and your UVB rays um really
anything above 30 you're only gonna get
an additional 1 to 2% of coverage so
it's not necessarily necessary to go
above that 30 okay but now that said it
is important of course to reapply my
kids have been my daughter's been in
surf camp this week and she came home
and I've got four different you know
sunscreens in the bag and they just
forget to reapply she came home
yesterday and she had some burns under
her eyes I'm sorry please you know you
need to reapply it's hard to remember
right how often should you reapply so
reapplying always follow the directions
on the back but a good rule of thumb is
every two hours even more liberally if
you have to if let's say you've been
sweating excessively doing outdoor
sports or if you've been swimming it's
interesting too because I think that
people they see water-resistant and they
assume that that means it's waterproof
but that's not the case no absolutely
not
so waterproof no sunscreen is absolutely
waterproof there is water resistance but
again you still need to make sure to
reapply so that you're covered and
you're safely protected so I'm a huge
fan when I'm not working in particular I
just throw on a little lip gloss I don't
like where
whole lot of makeup and I think that we
make assumptions as women that if we put
lip gloss on yeah it's got some
protection in it but that's not the case
no most of them don't if they do the
typical SPF coverage is only 15 so again
your lips are important you always want
to make sure that you're applying lip
balm with at least an SPF of interesting
you brought in this aquifer and I
typically have aquifer in my house just
my kids you know scrape their knees or
something but this is great also then
because it does I didn't realize it has
SPF 30 in it that you can use also that
you can put on and it also kind of give
you that vaseline feel to if your lips
are feeling really chapped as well there
there may be there are other things you
know there are a lot of women in
particular who go to the beach and don't
necessarily get in the water and want to
just keep all of the Sun off of them so
a reminder also that you can use a big
brimmed hat as well absolutely as well
as lightweight clothing you know
nowadays especially if the sport stores
you can find like those Columbia type
shirts they're lighter weight that are
better you know for coverage that aren't
going to be as hot it's interesting too
because I was just going through that as
well cuz my son's at a fishing camp he's
out in the Sun for like three or four
hours this morning and can we assume I
mean it better to cover because
sometimes it's like SPF 50 on the actual
shirt itself and I'm like alright come
on do I need to spend twenty dollars
more for the SPF 50 as opposed to just a
regular shirt as long as you're as long
as again you're wearing the long-sleeve
you've got the covering and that's
perfectly safe it I think another point
that we do need to make before we wrap
up also is is how early should you apply
the sunscreen before you go out in the
Sun I think there is a tendency you just
get all the stuff down to the beach and
then you apply the the sunscreen and
then you go in the water and has it
really had an opportunity to really
absorb into the skin so at least 15
minutes at least 15 minutes before
you're going outdoors and you're gonna
be exposed to the Sun and then of course
if you've got little babies under the
age of six months they typically tell
you still do they not not to apply any
sunscreen because you're not sure if
there's an allergy so you just need to
keep them completely protected right
okay all right keep that in mind Thank
You Jennifer for being here great
reminders for everybody thank you so if
you miss any of this interview by the
way or you would like to go back and
write down these kind of methods of sun
protection you can go to our website
news for Jack's comm we'll be posting
this interview later this morning under
the morning show page