Take Care of Your Hands

How to keep your hardest-working parts soft, smooth, and youthful for years to come.

How Your Hands Age

Whether gripping a steering wheel or scrubbing dishes, hands are the workhorses of the body. “They are exposed to sunlight, extreme temperatures, and a lot of wear and tear,” says Nelson Lee Novick, a clinical professor of dermatology at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, in New York City. And by age 30 skin-cell production decreases by 10 percent, making your skin less efficient at repairing itself. The tops of the hands, where the skin is thin, can show signs of age first―unlike the thicker-skinned, often-under-cover palms. (For instance, when hands lose plumpness, due to the breakdown of collagen and elastin and the loss of fat, veins and knuckles can start to look more prominent.) Here, five ways to keep your hands looking healthy and youthful.