By Karin McCay| email
Edited by Kristin Beerman | email
LUBBOCK, TX (KCBD) - You've probably heard the new health care reform includes a tax on tanning beds, something doctors are hoping will deter that practice. Dr. Claire Reddick, a dermatologist at the Texas Tech Health Sciences Center, clears the air about a common misunderstanding about tanning beds.
"Lots of tanning bed salons and proponents of those tanning beds will say, 'Oh we screen out the harmful rays,' but in fact you're still getting harmful rays that you do get from the sun, just in different doses from a tanning bed," said Dr. Reddick. "You're getting a lot of the rays that cause a lot of the photo aging effects, like wrinkles and sun spots and things like that, in addition to an increased risk of skin cancer."
Dr. Reddick adds your best protection from the sun is to wear a sunscreen with an SPF of 30 and one that has Broad Spectrum Protection on the label, meaning that it blocks both UVA and UVB rays.
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