Many of us pay close attention to the food we put inside our body, checking its origins and nutritional content, yet we fail to apply the same awareness to the products we use on our skin.

Becky Striepe, site director of Feelgoodstyle.com, pointed out that using organic beauty products can provide us with peace of mind and reassure us that we’re not slathering more chemicals into our face and body.

"While you’re obviously not drinking that bottle of hand lotion, some of those chemicals do leach into our bodies through our skin and they can build up over time. When you opt for organic cosmetics, you can feel a lot more confident that you’re getting a safe product," she noted.

However, lots of products display confusing information that purport it to be ’natural’ or ’herbal’ when it is in fact neither of those things, so Ms Striepe recommends looking at the list of ingredients to check what the item contains.

"One ingredient to keep an eye out for is fragrance. Fragrances are pretty common in beauty products and that term can mean any number of things. It could be something totally innocuous or a toxic chemical," she warned.

Wherever possible, opt for products scented with essential and herbal oils rather than fragrance or fragrance oils, the expert added.

Using natural beauty products could also help acne sufferers calm their complexion in a more effective way, with chamomile, cat’s claw and geranium extract all known to help soothe inflammation and redness.

Gugulipid, which is derived from the gum of the Mukul myrrh tree, has been used ancient Indian Ayurvedic medicine for nearly 3,000 years, and is said to reduce scarring left by acne. It can also help improve blood lipid profiles and strengthen the digestive system, and it can be taken in the form of capsules.

Posted by Laura Andrews