Welcome to Ask a Derm, a collection from SELF wherein board-certified dermatologists reply your urgent questions on pores and skin, hair, and nail well being. For this installment, we tapped Susan Massick, MD, FAAD, an affiliate professor of dermatology at The Ohio State College Faculty of Medication targeted on affected person care, resident training, and neighborhood engagement. Her specialties embody zits, moles, pores and skin most cancers, and eczema.

I’ve a few battle scars that remind me I survived coming of age within the early 2000s. One is a virtually closed-up stomach button piercing (a literal scar, courtesy of Britney mania) and the opposite is my barely sparse outer eyebrows. My greatest pal’s older sister plucked the hell out of them once I was in center college and I saved up the search for greater than a decade—up till a famend forehead professional advised me to put off the tweezers once I was working at my first journal job.

Slowly however absolutely, a few of these little hairs grew again, however my brows have been by no means fairly as full as they have been earlier than I began attacking them. So once I noticed a bunch of skincare influencers recommending Rogaine for eyebrows on TikTok, I needed to know: May that really work?! So I requested Susan Massick, MD, board-certified dermatologist and affiliate professor of dermatology at The Ohio State College Faculty of Medication, that very query.

The reply: “Theoretically, sure, however simply because one thing is trending on TikTok, that doesn’t imply it’s a good suggestion,” Dr. Massick tells SELF. “Topical minoxidil, the energetic ingredient in Rogaine, is just not FDA-approved nor has it been actively researched to be used on the eyebrows or instantly on the face.”

Minoxidil (a blood stress medicine in its oral type, by the way in which) has been FDA-approved as a hair loss remedy for the scalp, although, which is the premise for the eyebrow-growth claims on social media, Dr. Massick says. Researchers aren’t certain precisely the way it works, however “they consider it improves blood circulation to the follicles and will delay the energetic hair development part and sluggish the method of shedding,” she explains. That’s why Rogaine might help protect present strands and presumably regrow misplaced hair when used persistently in individuals with androgenic alopecia, an inherited situation also referred to as “male sample baldness” or “feminine sample hair loss,” she says.

So why not slather it in your overplucked millennial brows? Once more, there’s simply not sufficient proof to say that’s a sensible (or protected) transfer: “The few medical research taking a look at off-label use of topical minoxidil on the face have been for a small variety of individuals, for short-term trials of lower than 16 weeks, and at decrease concentrations of 1 to three%, in comparison with the standard 2 to five% in Rogaine merchandise,” Dr. Massick explains. “And irritation was a standard aspect impact.”

That final half is one other main cause why she advises in opposition to making use of Rogaine to the fragile pores and skin round your eyes. “A typical draw back to utilizing topical minoxidil is that individuals generally expertise rashes, itching, and swelling on account of a sensitivity or allergy—a results of both irritant or allergic contact dermatitis,” Dr. Massick says. “Rogaine incorporates alcohol and different chemical preservatives, too, which might additionally trigger irritation, itchiness, and scaling.”