Why Dermatologists Love Foot Slugging for Dry, Cracked Ft| Nicely+Good

Tthis is a cause why slugging—aka the apply of slathering your pores and skin in a thick occlusive because the final step in your nighttime skin-care routine—has re-entered the wonder dialog now that temps are hovering close to freezing in lots of elements of the nation. By making a form of seal on the floor of your pores and skin, slugging locks in moisture and permits the remainder of your merchandise .. which is precisely what we’d like throughout these dry winter months. On TikTok, you’ve got possible seen individuals slugging their faces, their nails, and even their hair, however in accordance with Lindsey Zubritsky, MD, a board-certified dermatologist whose greatest identified on social media as @DermGuru, in case you’re not doing it to your ft, you are significantly lacking out.

“I am a dermatologist, and that is the number-one hygiene hack I give my sufferers with tremendous dry, cracked ft,” she stated of foot slugging in a latest Instagram put up. “I promise you that is going to work—it really works on nearly all my sufferers.”

In response to Dr. Zubritsky, you will wish to begin the foot-slugging course of by soaking your ft in water for 5 to 10 minutes, “till they’re good and mushy,” she says. In case your ft are actually dry and cracked, you’ll be able to deal with them with a chemical exfoliant—like lactic acid, glycolic acid, or urea—to do away with any lifeless pores and skin, however in case you’re coping with run-of-the-mill dryness, you’ll be able to skip this step and transfer straight from the soaking to the slugging.

“Then you definitely’re going to coat these unhealthy boys within the thickest ointment that you’ve—AKA your Vaseline—and actually lube up [your feet],” says Dr. Zubritsky. From there, you will wish to seize two pairs of cotton socks so that you’ve one pair for every foot. “One of many socks [on each foot] ought to be damp, the opposite one ought to be dry,” says Dr. Zubritsky. “Put the damp sock on first, then cowl it with a dry sock. That is known as the ‘Soak and Smear’ methodology.” Your greatest guess is to do all of this at evening earlier than mattress—that method, you’ll be able to go to sleep along with your ft slathered and wrapped and get up with baby-smooth tootsies by morning.

As NYC-based podiatrist Suzanne Levine, DPM, beforehand informed us, “It’s a must to deal with your ft such as you deal with your face.” This looks like an A+ option to do precisely that every one winter lengthy.