Beauty Serum – Why You Need To Be Careful Opening Ampoules!

Beauty serum: the skin treatment that is taking the world by storm. These “pick-me-ups for your face” contain a highly-concentrated serum that can moisturise, nourish and even repair your skin. But have you ever stopped to consider the risks that you’re taking every time you snap one of these bad boys open?

What is an Ampoule?

Ampoules are small containers made from glass, usually carrying around 2 millilitres of beauty serum or medication. In the beauty industry, they have gained much popularity in recent years due to their effectiveness when it comes to treating skin, typically on one’s face.  The use of glass packaging allows for a reliable vacuum-seal on such small volumes; minimising leaks and contamination.

Because glass is so fragile, people are rightfully wary of the hazards of handling glass and treat ampoules with caution. The ampoules used in beauty treatments however, seem to be handled in a more care-free fashion.

Opening an Ampoule

To open an ampoule, the head must be “snapped off” so that the beauty serum inside can be used . It is common practice for people at home to wrap a towel or tissue around the head of the ampoule as a “protection” measure. While this might provide you with a sense of safety and security, it has been proven that this method of ampoule opening offers no real protection. For a more detailed breakdown about the possible risks ampoules can pose, check out our blog about ampoule injuries.

Why Should I be Worried?

Making use of towels and tissues still leaves you vulnerable to threats such as:

• Lacerations on your hands from the now jagged glass,
• Wasting the nutrient-rich serum from the ampoule,
• Losing the detached ampoule head, and
• Glass contamination

Glass contamination is not only almost invisible to the naked eye, but can also cause physical damage to anyone that uses a beauty serum.

Harsh opening techniques that use towels and tissues make it far more likely for microscopic shards of glass to break off the ampoule and contaminate the serum inside. If this happens, the glass shards could then be applied directly to naked skin along with the serum, and can cause serious physical damage – glass is definitely not something you want to be rubbing on your face!

What can I do to Protect Myself?

With these risks in mind, it’s clear that a clean and concise break of the ampoule is very important. To avoid getting hurt or wasting serum, people have started to use tools known as ampoule openers. When choosing an ampoule opener, you should consider:

• How your ampoule opener guards your fingers,
• If the opener will make ampoules easier to open with less force,
• Does the opener hold the ampoule’s head to make it easy to dispose of?
• How your opener helps you break open ampoules “cleanly”.

There are several tools on the market that are made for opening ampoules, however none provide complete protection from all the risks that come with opening an ampoule. None that is, except the Qlicksmart SnapIT.

The SnapIT is a handy reusable ampoule opener that allows for safe opening and disposal to stop you from getting hurt not only during the dangerous process of opening an ampoule, but afterwards as well. Beauty should not come at the price of safety. If you use a beauty serum to keep your skin happy and healthy, make sure that you’re using the right tool to keep you safe.

References

Katie Stanovick (2018). “What are Ampoules and Do I actually Need Them?”, http://stylecaster.com/beauty/ampoule-for-skin-care/

S.T. Lye, N.C. Hwang (2008). “Glass contamination: is it here to stay?”, http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1046/j.1365-2044.2003.296812.x

CrossMedixUK (2017). “Ampoules and Glass Vials – Pros and Cons”, http://crossmedix.com/2017/08/04/ampoules-and-glass-bottles-pros-and-cons/

Antonio Roberto Carraretto (2011). “Glass ampoules: risks and benefits”, http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?pid=S0034-70942011000400013&script=sci_arttext&tlng=en

Babor (2018). “Hydra Plus Ampoule Concentrate”, http://au.babor.com/products/fluids-fp/59892-hydra-plus.html#text