Clinical Phytoestrogen Elasticity Renewal Body Treatment and Clinical Phytoestrogen Elasticity Renewal Serum are two recent launches from Paula’s Choice that address a key demographic audience in the skin care market. Founder Paula Begoun shares insight into the development of the two formulations that tackle menopause-related skin issues with phytoestrogen.

HAPPI: Women have been going through menopause forever, but only recently has the conversation become more public. What has led to the increased understanding of how menopause impacts skin?

Begoun: First, it’s important to define what menopause is because there are conflicting definitions, and some are woefully inadequate to explain what a woman’s body is going through as her estrogen levels diminish causing her periods to eventually stop.

Menopause is still often described as when a woman’s ovaries stop producing hormones (estrogens and progesterone). If a woman doesn’t get her period for 12 consecutive months than she is officially considered to be menopausal. Unfortunately, that definition does not take into consideration the variations billions of women may experience.

It is now well established that menopause is a process that begins when a woman is in her early 40s as her ovaries slowly (though sometimes abruptly) reduce production of ovarian hormones. Then over the next 10 to 25 years ovarian hormones (especially estrogens) continue to decrease until they reach a level when a woman’s period stops altogether. This new distinction is incredibly significant for how a woman can view her overall health and skin care needs.

Dozens of studies over the years have documented how estrogen loss negatively impacts skin including loss of elasticity, collagen depletion, extensive epidermal thinning, impaired wound healing, protruding veins, increased wrinkling especially crepey skin, increased dryness, deficient amounts of hydrating substances such as hyaluronic acid, often undesirable color changes and prevention of free radical damage.

What has changed in terms of skin care and estrogen loss is the overwhelming proof of efficacy and safety that applying either phytoestrogens or prescription estrogens (specifically estradiol) can have on the significantly improved appearance of skin.

The transformation in public awareness is most likely due to the change in how many scientists and doctors all over the world now view the Women’s Health Initiative study (WHI) that took place from 1991 until 2002 which evaluated the health effects of oral hormone replacement therapy (HRT) for estrogen loss. That study’s conclusions culminated in making almost everyone afraid of HRT. The problem with the WHI study that was eventually recognized was the WHI study didn’t evaluate HRT for women beginning to go through menopause which is when HRT is typically prescribed, but rather the study evaluated the effects of HRT a decade or more after menopause already took place.

As it turned out, age at starting HRT is critical in determining the benefit/risk of HRT. In fact, it is now known that many of the problems older women have who didn’t take HRT (such as heart disease, osteoporosis and dementia) could have been prevented if HRT was started sooner rather than later.

When initiated within 10 years of menopause, HRT reduces all-cause mortality and risks of coronary disease, osteoporosis and dementias. Doctors are now far more likely to prescribe oral or topical HRT when a woman is in her late 40s or early 50s and the immediate improvement these women experience is probably what the new buzz is all about. [Source: Climacteric, 2021 Feb;24(1):3-10.]

HAPPI: How excited are you to bring these products to fruition, and how has the reception been so far?

Begoun: I really have no words to express how excited I am about my Clinical Phytoestrogen Elasticity Renewal Serum and Clinical Phytoestrogen Elasticity Renewal Body Treatment.

It all began about five years ago when I was studying the visible impact of estrogen loss on aging in general including the skin and how skin care could help.

As I mentioned, estrogen loss is a major factor along with sun damage for what we think of as skin aging. The abundant amount of data and facts were so conclusive about how topically applied estrogens or phytoestrogens could improve skin it became an obsession for me to formulate targeted beneficial products for Paula’s Choice Skincare. My only regret is that I didn’t do this 20 years ago because it would have been remarkable for my skin because, as is true with any aspect of skin care, it is always better to prevent problems than repair damage after it has already taken place! Each of these targeted treatments for estrogen-depleted skin feature non-hormonal plant-derived ingredients specifically formulated to counter the unique signs of skin aging that coincide with decreasing levels of estrogen. It’s something we’re just not seeing other skin care brands doing right now.

I am proud to say these two products rank among our most successful product launches to date.

HAPPI: How is phytoestrogen different than estrogen? What are the benefits in skin care? And, can you please explain how it works in topical skin care?

Begoun: Estrogen is a term describing a category of hormones that are primarily responsible for the development and regulation of the female reproductive system as well as secondary sex characteristics. There are three major forms of estrogen produced in the body that have estrogenic hormonal activity, which are estrone, estradiol and estriol. Estradiol is the hormone that has the most significant impact on the health and appearance of skin. This is because the skin has an abundance of estrogen receptor sites to which estradiol binds.

Phytoestrogen is a term used to describe substances produced by plants that are similar in structure to the estrogens produced by the body The most researched phytoestrogens are those derived from soy which are daidzein, genistein and equol.

Despite its name, phytoestrogens are not hormones or estrogens. Rather they are estrogen-similar compounds found in a wide variety of plants from soy to carrots, flaxseed, oats, garlic, spinach, hops, plums, grapes and many others. One of the major differences between phytoestrogens and estrogens when applied topically is that phytoestrogens don’t absorb into the body and have no systemic impact, estrogens (estradiol) do absorb into the body and have a systemic impact.

Phytoestrogens from plants can provide skin with better smoothness, texture, stability, hydration, collagen support, barrier repair, reduced oxidative stress and balanced oil production. In other words topical phytoestrogens make skin believe it has estrogen levels like it did before estrogen loss started.

HAPPI: What is the difference between the formulas?

Begoun: It is mostly about texture because you can absolutely use the body product on your face and the serum on your body, it’s up to you. We developed a body product and a face product mostly because many women prefer using two separate products with one being specifically labeled for the body and the other for the face. However, the face serum does additionally contain resveratrol which is a potent anti-aging ingredient as well as a phytoestrogen. Resveratrol is also an exceedingly expensive ingredient which is why the face product is more expensive than the body product.

HAPPI: Is the serum added to a routine or is it a substitute for another product? How do you help educate consumers about when these products could help?

Begoun: Both the serum and body treatment products would be in addition to your current skin care routine because these are targeted to a very specific skin condition other products don’t address. For best results, topical phytoestrogens or estrogens should be combined with other anti-aging superheroes such as retinol, bakuchiol, vitamin C, peptides, niacinamide, BHA (beta hydroxy acid) and AHA (alpha hydroxy acid). In terms of when you should start using one or both of my topical phytoestrogen products here are my suggestions. Because estrogen loss begins when a woman is in her early 40s you can start using them in your early to mid-40s to prevent the visible signs of aging estrogen loss will cause skin over time. You can also wait until you are in your 50s when symptoms of menopause have already begun which means you are both preventing and addressing damage that has already taken place. However, it is also never too late to start using a well-formulated topical phytoestrogen product. For example, I didn’t start using the beta forms of our phytoestrogen products until I was in my 60s when estrogen loss had already taken a toll on my skin but the overall improvement after just three months was so amazing it became one of the many reasons why we made the decision to launch them.

HAPPI: Paula’s Choice never rests on its laurels. Is there anything pipeline that you can share?

Begoun: Indeed, we are always working on several new formulations at any given time and the research we do is an ongoing endless process. Even more importantly, because what we are working on is often ground-breaking we don’t share that information until the product is just about ready to be launched. Plus, I’ve learned over the years that one of the worse things any company can do is announce they are working on a product which piques a customers’ interest making them want to know when it will launch but for myriad reasons it never does. That ends up disappointing your customers which is never a good thing.