Discoloured skin

Hyper pigmentation is a fairly common condition of the skin, usually harmless in which patches of skin become darker in colour than the normal surrounding skin. This darkening happens when an excess of melanin, the brown pigment that produces normal skin colour forms deposits on the skin.

Age or 'Liver' spots are a common form of hyper pigmentation. They occur due to sun damage and are usually found on the hands and face or other areas frequently exposed to the sun.

Melasma or chloasma spots are similar in appearance to age spots but are larger areas of darken skin that appears most often as a result of hormonal changes. For example, pregnancy my trigger overproduction of melanin that causes the 'mask of pregnancy' on the face and darkened areas of skin on the abdomen and other areas. Women who take birth control pills may also develop hyper pigmentation because their bodies undergo similar hormonal changes that occur during pregnancy.

Freckles (an inherited characteristic), age spots and other darkened skin patches can become darker or more pronounced when skin is exposed to the skin, this is because melanin absorbs the energy of the suns harmful ultra violet rays in order to protect the skin from overexposure. Normally the results of this process in skin tanning which vends to darken areas that are already hyper pigmented. Wearing a sunscreen is essential. The sunscreen must block both UVA and UVB rays. A single day of excess sun can wreck months of treatment.

Be sure to check with your GP if freckles or moles change.