Causes of sagging skin all over the body

There are many reasons for sagging skin all over the body. The most common one is age. With age, the body's collagen content decreases and the metabolic rate of the skin also decreases, which often causes the skin to become sagging. Another cause is cutis laxity, which is a genetic disease caused by impaired development of dermal elastic fibers. It often causes wrinkles in the subcutaneous tissue and causes excessive sagging.

Causes of sagging skin all over the body

The congenital type is inherited as an autosomal recessive trait, and partly as an autosomal dominant trait. It is caused by abnormal congenital copper ion metabolism, which affects the concentration of elastase and causes congenital developmental defects of elastic fibers, leading to the disease. There are reports of children whose mothers took penicillamine to treat cystinuria developing skin sagging because penicillamine can interfere with the cross-linking of collagen fibers and elastic fibers. The acquired type has no genetic background and no family history, and the disease often develops secondary to skin inflammation.

Examination for cutis laxa 1. Physical examination: The skin of the whole body can be seen to be loose and sagging, which is more obvious in the neck, face and skin folds. Young children may have the appearance of an elderly person, and some may be accompanied by hernia, diverticulum, emphysema signs, and may also be combined with eczema and urticaria skin lesions. 2. In histopathological examination, orcein staining is more likely to show lesions than HE staining. Elastic fibers are significantly reduced or even absent, especially in the dermis. Most of the elastic fibers become shorter, thicker, and of inconsistent thickness. Some are spindle-shaped, and their appearance may be blurred or granular, degenerated, and broken.

Treatment of cutis laxa 1. General treatment: Strengthen skin care to avoid trauma and secondary infection. Pay attention to nutrition, give a high-protein, high-vitamin diet, and eat less spicy and other irritating foods. 2. Etiological treatment: Find the cause, remove the inducing factors, and actively treat infections and endocrine diseases in the body. 3. Symptomatic treatment can be performed for those whose appearance is affected, but it cannot prevent the development of sagging. When hernia is formed, repair surgery is performed and symptomatic treatment is given to relieve the patient's pain. Respiratory function tests can diagnose the presence of emphysema at an early stage so that proactive measures can be taken.