Why You Can Trust This Doctor With Your Sensitive Skin

So many brands out there claim their products are safe for sensitive skin; but if your skin’s especially sensitive, there are plenty of products out there that can still wreak havoc on your skin, even if they’ve been labelled “suitable for sensitive skin” (our writer Jade would know).
That’s why when we sat down for the press presentation by Taiwanese skincare brand Dr. Wu and were told that their skincare products, touted as “clinical skincare”, were made of sensitive skin, that didn’t make much of an impression – plenty of other brands have told us the same thing, so can you blame us?
This perspective started to shift a little when we sat down for an interview with Dr. Wu himself. Yes, there’s an actual Dr. Wu behind the brand name; full name Dr. Wu Ying-Chin, and he’s a dermatologist, renowned in Taiwan, and in 2003 he started this brand together with his eldest son, Eric Wu. The brand Dr. Wu has since become one of the most prominent Taiwanese beauty brands outside of its homeland, known for its products that are supposed to replicate the effects of clinical skin treatments.

What made up sit up and really pay attention was when Dr. Wu revealed this: that he himself suffers from very sensitive skin – we’re talking eczema-level kind of sensitivities.
“Our family is a family of atopic dermatitis,” Dr. Wu says, using the medical term for eczema. Him and his two sons suffer from the condition, and he reveals it’s also part of what motivated him to become a dermatologist. He told us that for them, it manifests as itchiness, and “oozing skin”; but we saw no trace of that on his flawless skin.
It’s thanks to years of using his own products of course, he tells us. A personal understanding of what is truly “sensitive skin”, as well as years of working with patients who suffer from similar conditions (Barbie Hsu, or “Big S”, is one of them), has led him to mandate his products meet two requirements: Be safe, and be efficacious. “They should have a highly potent content, but not be irritating to the skin. This is the major difference of our products.”
To ensure the formulations are truly safe, the brands implements testing periods for each one, and does not use any alcohol, fragrances, or animal products. It also helps that Dr. Wu runs them by his patients too. “Our products are quite different from the other companies. We use it in the clinic first, especially for diseased skin. When the diseased skin can accept it, I think it’s no problem for healthy skin,” he explains.
One of the “safe” ingredients that the brand has become known for is the classic hyaluronic acid; by now, they’ve developed a “fifth generation hyaluronic acid” known as the HyaluComplex, a patented technology. “It keeps our serum very smooth, easily absorbed, and not irritating to the skin. It also penetrates deeper into the epidermal cells,” explains Dr. Wu.

Another well-known ingredient when it comes to Dr. Wu products is mandelic acid, a kind of alpha hydroxy acid that is used for skin renewal. One of the more popular products (ranked no. 2, in fact) is the Intensive Renewal Serum With Mandelic Acid 18%, which mimics a chemical peel and is to be used once a week to refine skin texture. Dr. Wu explains that mandelic acid is a larger molecule than other similar acids and permeates the skin at a slower rate, which helps reduce the risk of the skin reacting badly to it. It’s an ingredient that Dr. Wu’s been using it on his patients for more than 5 years already.

And now, there’s the new Daily Renewal Serum With Mandelic Acid, with a gentler formula that was designed for dry and sensitive skin. As the name implies, this one can be used every day, and even together with the once-a-week Intensive Renewal Serum if you want to double up on the mandelic acid. “New skin will come,” promises Dr Wu. What we can say about it is that this watery serum feels ridiculously silky, and with a few days of daily use so far, our skin’s feeling promisingly smooth indeed.

During the interview, we also found out that Dr. Wu is 71 years old this year; and we have never seen a 71-year-old with skin this line-free. His wife, who’s 66, was also present on the event, and she looked barely out of her 50s. We had to know his secret, and he said it’s all kudos to more than a decade’s use of the Ageversal Repairing System, which uses olive oil-derived squalane to keep skin smooth and elastic.

We definitely want some of whatever he’s having, if we get to have skin that looks like that at 71.
 
Dr. Wu is available at Watsons stores. en.drwu.com
Images: Dr. Wu Facebook page