What does the skin do? The fascinating functions you didn’t know about.
by James Hubbard, M.D., M.P.H.
Quick, what is your body’s largest organ? If you haven’t guessed by the title, it’s the skin.
Of course, the skin is aesthetic, but it’s so much more. Maybe beauty is more than skin deep, but many functions on which you rely aren’t. The skin is multilayered, multifunctional and dynamic. Old cells continually slough off, as new cells replace them. As a doctor, I’m amazed by its restorative powers. Scrape it and it grows back. If you get a bad cut, pull the edges close, and voila, it grows together.
Here are a few of its functions you may not know about.
Water Proofing
- Oil from glands in the skin helps. Sure, skin can get saturated, but water doesn’t penetrate into your body.
Central Air
- It keeps our temperature in the range our other organs work best. When we’re too warm, it tells our body to bring more blood close to the skin surface to cool off before it goes back to our core organs. Also, sweat forms and evaporates. When we’re too cold, it tells our body to direct more blood to our core to warm us.
Storage
- For calorie storage and insulation, most of us are all too familiar with its fat storing capabilities.
Synthesizer
- With the aid of ultraviolet rays from the sun, the skin takes some of our cholesterol and converts it to vitamin D.
Sensor
- It contains the nerves we need to discern touch, pain, heat, cold, pressure and vibration. For instance, if we touch something that causes pain, we recoil in an instant, using a time saving ”reflex system”: Instead of going to the brain, the nerves go straight to the spinal cord, which automatically triggers nerves to tell our muscles to move away.
Protection
- It not only keeps our innards from debris and pathogens, such as viruses, bacteria and parasites, but calls up antibodies and white cells to fight off against invaders that try to penetrate its barrier.
Is there any wonder we need to keep this fabulous machine in working order? Details on that in the next post.
Doctors and business owners: Send customized issues of James Hubbard’s My Family Doctor to your customers or patients. E-mail publisher-at-familydoctormag.com for details.
As with all information on this site, this article cannot replace professional, personal medical advice. Read more here.
Tags: skin health
April 1st, 2009 at 7:49 am
Fascinating information! I’m really glad I read your blog. There is so much new information, and too much I’ve forgotten since school. Thank you!
Dr. Js last blog post..Dr. J on doctors and mechanics
April 1st, 2009 at 9:01 am
Thanks Dr. J.
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April 8th, 2009 at 12:02 am
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