Estrogen Creams & Skincare:
Benefits, Uses, and Who Should Try Them

Hi, everyone. Welcome back to The Skin Report, I’m Dr. Simran Sethi, and today, we are talking about estrogen creams. A lot of people are asking me, what are estrogen creams? Are they useful for skin? Are they good for hair health, nail health? Are they for people in menopause? So let’s go over that. I’m going to break down what types of estrogen creams there are, and then we’ll go into who are they right for. So at the end of this episode, I’m actually going to tell you who are the right candidates for an estrogen cream.

So let’s start with estrogen. Estrogen is a hormone that is naturally produced in women and is obviously something that we have for the entirety of our life, but its levels fluctuate with age. And when women get into their forties or fifties, they start developing symptoms of menopause, and that is caused by a reduction in estrogen, progesterone, which is another hormone.

So estrogen creams are something that have been used actually for decades, but not for skin care, but as creams that are used to replace the lost estrogen women are experiencing as they’re getting close to menopause or going through menopause. Recently though, there have been skin care products that include estrogen in them and that are used specifically for improvement of skin, not menopausal symptoms, and they do that by replacing the estrogen that your body is not naturally producing.

So the first distinction when you’re thinking of estrogen creams is the strength of the estrogen in the cream, and is it being used for menopausal symptoms, in which case the estrogen has to be a higher strength. It has to manage symptoms like hot flashes, insomnia, typical symptoms of menopause, versus an estrogen skin care cream, which only should be applied on the face or the neck, and is probably a really low dose of estrogen combined with other products or ingredients that make it a good skin care product, which will allow the skin to experience the benefits of estrogen, like collagen production and improved hydration. So those are the two types of estrogen creams that we can use when it’s for menopausal symptoms, higher strength. The other is for skin improvement, reduction in fine lines, improvement in hydration, in which case it’s a low-dose estrogen combined with probably other ingredients that help with skin hydration.

So why would you use an estrogen cream for your skin? So first of all, remember, if you want to use estrogen for symptom control of menopause symptoms, then you would not use an estrogen skincare product. But if you are experiencing excess laxity in your skin, fine lines, dryness, then you likely are having these symptoms because of reduced estrogens in your body, which means that if you apply estrogen onto your skin, you can replace some of the things that estrogen normally does for your skin. And this menopausal hormonal shift can start anywhere as early as 10 years before you even go into menopause.

So the most common thing I hear from patients is that my skin was always normal or maybe it was oily, but by the time I got into my forties, I noticed my skin started getting dry and now it’s just really dry. No matter how much moisturizer apply, a few hours later, it’s dry again. Likely this is a drop in estrogen levels, and that would be something that an estrogen cream should address.

The second reason why someone should consider an estrogen cream is laxity in the skin. So estrogen helps make your skin produce more collagen, elastin. All of these skin proteins will help with making your skin tighter. So again, if somebody has more laxity in their skin, they’re noticing skin around the eyes getting really loose, jowling or their neck is looking like they’re having a lot of lines and just kind of looser, their jawline is not as prominent, that’s skin laxity. And I think estrogen is again, an excellent solution for that.

But remember, when you’re looking at an estrogen skincare product, try and look for a product that also includes hydrating ingredients within it or lipid-rich ingredients. That is only going to make that skincare product better, and if it doesn’t have it, then supplement with the skincare product that adds lipids because that is something that your skin is low on if you do have low estrogen levels and something that hydrates the skin or helps keep hydration in your skin.

The other thing is if you are undergoing any kind of chemotherapy or some sort of medical treatment where you’re put into menopause early, which your doctor will clearly let you know about, your estrogen levels are naturally going to be lower, you can have estrogen in your skincare. Aside from that, there’s really no reason to use skincare with estrogen in it.

So a question that some people ask is, “Well, should I use estrogen creams for prevention of skin changes related to reduction in estrogen?” The answer is no. If you don’t have a low estrogen level, you don’t need to use estrogen in your skincare. It’s not really going to do anything. Instead, focus on things like hydration, adding actives like peptides, retinol in your skincare, sunblock. So mid-forties and onwards, it is a good consideration, and you don’t need to do any kind of prevention of skin aging by using estrogen in your skincare.

Okay, so if you’re going to add an estrogen cream to your skincare routine, where do you add it? That kind of depends on the consistency of the product that this estrogen is in and also the other products you’re using. But a general rule of thumb is that the thicker the product, the later on in the skincare routine it’s applied. So basically, if you have a product, a cream that’s very lipid-rich, it’s very emollient, it’s on the thicker side, if you apply it first, it’s going to interfere in the absorption of something that’s on the lighter side.

But in a typical routine, you are likely going to cleanse first, apply a vitamin C serum or an estrogen serum on your skin, especially if it’s more watery, you would apply that first before applying anything else. And then on top of that, likely you’re going to need a moisturizer. And then moisturizer will likely also be on the thicker side, maybe have lipids in it because women who are using estrogen in their skincare also will have dry skin. After that, apply your hyaluronic acid. And this is a common misconception. People think that they should apply hyaluronic acid first on their skin because it helps with hydration, but that’s not true. Hyaluronic acid’s job is to seal hydration, so you have to apply it on top of your moisturizer. So your hyaluronic acid serum or cream is going to be the last product you apply. And if you’re applying this during the day, you would put sunblock on top of that and of course at night, then you could even apply your retinol on top of that. But that’s pretty much the order in which you would use your estrogen cream, kind of like a serum or a moisturizer.

If you work in the aesthetic space, are an esthetician, are a medical spa provider, I would love to hear what kind of questions your clients and patients are asking you about estrogen and skincare. Or if you’re just curious and have any questions, please comment below. And don’t forget to subscribe and hit that notification bell so that you can be notified whenever we have any new content posted.