Seems pretty good! My mental model is something like: 80% of the value of skincare comes from sunscreen + moisturizer, 15% from vitamin A, and then everything else is either speculative or has small improvements. Some things you might want to consider to further optimize the remaining 5%, if you want:
A relatively gentle exfoliant, 1-2x/week (used instead of the products you would normally apply). Alpha hydroxy acids are pretty popular and usually don’t cause a terribly strong reaction (though you probably will be red for a day).
Vitamin C (in the morning), particularly if you have hyperpigmentation.
Microneedling has results that are roughly comparable to tretinoin, and additionally aids in product delivery (for the obvious reason that the needles poke through your epidermis). So you could consider this, although it’s substantially more invasive than the other things on this list (while still being considered “minimally invasive”).
The three products you mentioned have slightly different pH’s; possibly you are already doing this, but consider spacing out their application (e.g. tretinoin at night, niacinamide in the morning).
Since you offered: 0.015% tretinoin + niacinamide 4% + urea 5% moisturiser at night, SPF50 in the morning. What else should I be doing?
Seems pretty good! My mental model is something like: 80% of the value of skincare comes from sunscreen + moisturizer, 15% from vitamin A, and then everything else is either speculative or has small improvements. Some things you might want to consider to further optimize the remaining 5%, if you want:
A relatively gentle exfoliant, 1-2x/week (used instead of the products you would normally apply). Alpha hydroxy acids are pretty popular and usually don’t cause a terribly strong reaction (though you probably will be red for a day).
Vitamin C (in the morning), particularly if you have hyperpigmentation.
Microneedling has results that are roughly comparable to tretinoin, and additionally aids in product delivery (for the obvious reason that the needles poke through your epidermis). So you could consider this, although it’s substantially more invasive than the other things on this list (while still being considered “minimally invasive”).
The three products you mentioned have slightly different pH’s; possibly you are already doing this, but consider spacing out their application (e.g. tretinoin at night, niacinamide in the morning).