In summer, you have to protect your skin from the sun, this is well known. it is indeed true that the sun has extraordinary effects on our mood and psyche, that it makes us more beautiful, but this is not the case for our skin. Among the most noticeable effects of the sun, especially in summer, can be the annoying and painful erythema, skin photo-ageing - a set of skin changes due to sun exposure, which are also added to the inevitable age-related changes - and even the possibility of precancerous skin lesions.

Over the years, fortunately, there has been a strong public awareness of these issues. The problem, however, is that not many people know that it is not enough to protect oneself from the sun only in summer, the sun can be a danger all year round. Even when we are in the car or at our desk, the sun's rays are not completely blocked by the glass; 50 per cent of ultraviolet rays still manage to get through. When we are in the park or on the street. If in summer the danger is UVB rays, responsible for erythema and sunburn, for the rest of the year it is the UVA rays that are the silent attackers of the skin, because year after year they thin it, they can fill it with dyschromia and expression marks.

Not to mention the mountains or the sea out of season. These are ideal months for skiing weeks or faraway trips to exotic destinations in the heat. But a survey sponsored by Roche and conducted by GfK Eurisko on the subject of 'the sun out of season' reveals a rather worrying picture. 44% of Italians consider sunbathing at the seaside in summer to be more dangerous, underestimating the risks of sunburn in the cold months, on the ski slopes or on distant beaches. Prevention is often forgotten in these cases. Yet in winter it is even worse because the skin is out of training and even in the mountains the sun can be bad for you: ultraviolet ray levels increase by as much as 10-12% for every thousand metres of altitude, not to mention that snow reflects about 80% of the rays, compared to 25% for the sea and 15% for sand. This is why it is really important to protect the skin all year round, at the seaside as well as in the mountains.

So what should you do? Protect your skin withadequate sun protection, in summer and winter, at the seaside and in the mountains. Also be careful in the city, during the winter months, using moisturising day creams with UVA filters.

Alternatively, we can use aesthetic medicine to repair the damage caused by photoageing with biorevititalisation, hyaluronic acid fillers, med visage or lipofilling.

Biorevititalisation counteracts ageing by stimulating the production of fibroblasts in the dermis, thus providing it with deep hydration. For wrinkles, hyaluronic acid fillers are a certainty for facial angiaging. Hyaluronic acid is normally present in our connective tissue and the purpose of treatment is to replenish the missing portion in facial wrinkles. The Med Visage is an innovative system that uses the action of ultrasound to stimulate the growth of new collagen, producing a natural lifting effect. Lastly, lipofilling of the face consists of harvesting adipose tissue from areas of the body where it is particularly abundant (abdomen, hips, thighs, etc.), purifying it from the blood, and then injecting it into areas of the face to fill in wrinkles.

These are all very effective treatments to act on skin ageing caused by the sun, but they have no power in preventing skin diseases such as melanoma. So remember: protection first!