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Ca

Capsaicin

Capsicum Frutescens Fruit Extract

The chili-pepper compound in warming products. It acts on the nerve pathway behind rosacea flushing, but hasn’t been tested on rosacea.

What it does

It’s what makes chilies hot, and it turns up in warming and lip-plumping products. Rosacea flushing runs through a nerve receptor that spicy food and heat switch on, and in rosacea it overreacts. Capsaicin hasn’t been tested on rosacea-prone skin. So it’s best avoided during a flare, as a caution rather than a measured result.

The EU’s ingredient database lists it as a skin conditioner, its general term for an ingredient that keeps skin in good condition.European Commission, CosIng (© European Union, CC BY 4.0) · uses put in plain words by Drop ↗

The evidence, graded

expert consensusMenthol is on the AAD's list of ingredients to avoid in skin care when you have rosacea. Drop holds peppermint oil, capsaicin and cinnamal alongside it during a flare, on the shared TRPV1 mechanism and on the absence of any test. No study read here applied any of the four to rosacea-prone skin.Steinhoff 2011 · Journal of Investigative Dermatology Symposium Proceedings ↗

Graded per the methodology: strong · moderate · emerging · expert consensus. A weak source on a strong claim gets the weaker label.

Also known as

chili extract

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