Left Brain Reflects…
Last week, the Beauty Brains published a piece about Imedeen and whether a food supplement could actually improve your skin’s condition.
Our conclusion…maybe it helps a little, but it hardly seems worth the cost.
Then Kai, one of our Beauty Brains community members, asked us about a study that was published in the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition. She asks, what we think of this data.
Imedeen Clinical Study
The study Kai references is interesting. In it, post-menopausal women were given Imedeen Prime Renewal or a placebo over a 6-month period. Their skin was graded at various times by professional evaluators. The most significant part of the study design was that it was a double-blinded, placebo controlled study. Double-blinded just means that neither the people getting the treatment, nor the people evaluating the participants knew who got the placebo or who got the Imedeen.
This double-blinded nature of the studies is typically missing in similar studies like this.
The study was conducted by Stephens and Associates, a respected, independent testing company for the cosmetic and medical industries.
Imedeen Study Results
In this study, 38 women were given the Imedeen while 42 were given the placebo. 20 women had to drop out of the study for various reasons so their data is not included. According to the data, people taking the Imedeen were shown to have significantly improved skin (compared to the placebo) with less facial wrinkles, less sagging skin, less under eye dark circles, improved skin on the hands and a variety of other measures.
Impressively, objective data taken through ultrasound measurements even showed significant differences.
The authors conclude that after 6 months of taking 4 Imedeen Prime Renewal
pills each day, skin in post-menopausal women is improved.
Imedeen Theory.
No matter what the data from a study shows, I always like to see what the authors think is the scientific rationale behind why something works. They say that Imedeen could work by modulating the balance of lipid inflammatory mediators. They site previous studies on some plant and fish oils that have also had this effect. The key elements of the Imedeen include
- a. Soy Extract
- b. Fish polysaccharides
- c. White tea extract
- d. Grape seed extract
- e. Tomato extract
- f. Vitamin C
- g. Vitamin E
- h. Zinc
The reason Imedeen is supposed to work better on post-menopausal women is that the soy isoflavones in it may mimic the effects of estrogen in skin. If true, that sounds a little scary. Other things like tomato, grape seed, and white tea extract are supposed to work as anti-oxidants.
Some Skepticism
While this Imedeen study is good and gives some interesting results, consider the following concerns.
1. Small study: A study of 80 people is small and would not be used to make definitive claims. A pharmaceutical company would require a much larger group (300 – 3000 or more).
2. Publication bias: There’s a reason that sponsored research almost always produces positive results. If they have a bad result, they just don’t publish the results. I wonder, how many clinical studies did Imedeen do before publishing this one? And why didn’t they do a study on ALL women? (hint: they probably did).
3. No comparison: While the study was a double-blinded one, it didn’t compare the Imedeen treatment to topical treatments. Maybe those work better for less money. This is what people really want to know!
Is Imedeen worth it?
That last point is the biggest remaining question. Will Imedeen supplements work better than daily use of a good skin moisturizing treatment? While I have no data, I suspect the answer is no. Daily skin moisturizing treatments are proven to work and do so much quicker than the 6-months required for Imedeen to work.
Beauty Brains Bottom Line
While I was extremely skeptical about Imedeen having any benefit, their work in the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition is a legitimate study, done by legitimate researchers, published in a legitimate journal. Kudos to the folks at Imedeen for their thoroughness. They’ve done much more than any food supplement company I’ve ever seen.
However, I remain skeptical that $500 for a 6-month supply is worth the money. And I’m still concerned that the food supplement industry is not regulated so they can sell you anything they want and call it Imedeen.
But you might find these results compelling. Feel free to try Imedeen Prime Renewal