Caroline MacGillivray believes in the healing power of movement—from the way she moves her body as an instructor for pole dance, barre, and aerial hammock stretch classes, to the movement she started when she founded Beauty Night Society. It’s a Vancouver-based organization that empowers women and children living in poverty and staying in shelters and recovery centres with care, compassion and free wellness and aesthetician services. And it’s the work that’s closest to MacGillivray’s community building heart.
Now 51, MacGillivray wasn’t always athletic—she says she was a shy, geeky kid with poor hand-eye coordination who was picked last in gym class. But she studied ballet, and at age 12 she began helping with beginner skating lessons in exchange for free classes. She loved the freedom she felt on the ice, and she finds a similar sense of whirling, spinning weightlessness and suspension— along with feel-good endorphins and a confidence boost—in pole dance and aerial fitness.
She first discovered pole dance when she was researching a dating column she wrote for a now-defunct community newspaper. At the end of class, she crawled up to the pole and demonstrated what she learned and was soon invited back as an instructor. MacGillivray is someone who exudes love and care for others, even though her own health has been up and down lately: A year ago, she was diagnosed with chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML) and had to take a temporary step back from her busy teaching schedule and from her in-person beauty events to protect her compromised immune system. (She still worked behind the scenes, running the organization and doing outreach.)
One pandemic silver lining has been virtual classes: MacGillivray leads qi gong, meditation and self-massage workshops from her Cambie Village apartment, setting up her laptop and yoga mat next to her fireplace. Her hairless Sphynx cat, Ripley, often wanders into the Zoom frame. She finds inspiration through a fellow CML patient she met who had recovered enough to plan a multi-day hiking trip along the West Coast Trail on Vancouver Island. The idea that, one day, she too could be strong enough for a hiking adventure has given MacGillivray hope.
In the meantime, she takes care of herself with rest and guided meditation, especially when she’s doing lots of teaching. Here’s what a day in her life looks like.
7:30AM MacGillivray still teaches an average of 15 to 17 fitness classes a week, though her CML diagnosis has forced her to take it easy when she needs to. “I’m blessed that, with medication, it’s a manageable condition. There are side effects, but I’m stronger than I think,” she says. “And I need to celebrate life, because I’m alive.”
11:30AM MacGillivray works primarily out of the Mt. Pleasant location of Tantra Fitness. She says that the balance work, spine decompression, mobility and restorative poses of aerial hammock stretch are a great counterpoint to pole dancing, which is more active.
1:45PM MacGillivray is rarely without a book in her hand, and devours 10 to 15 books a week, so she’s a frequent visitor to her public library and many of the Little Free Library drop-off and pickup locations in Vancouver. She only keeps the books that are dearest to her (like her copy of Judy Blume’s Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret).
4:00PM MacGillivray spends about 25 hours a week teaching classes and holding private sessions with her fitness clients, but anywhere from 25 to 40 hours weekly on her Beauty Night Society work. As executive director, she manages orientations, recruiting, volunteer coordination, grant writing and paperwork.
5:45PM Set-up for Beauty Night begins, with clients arriving just 15 minutes later. “We’re a well-oiled machine by now,” MacGillivray says. Before the pandemic, the organization was serving as many as 300 women a week, but numbers (and shelter capacity limits) have reduced a bit since then.
6:00PM MacGillivray is half Chinese Canadian, and Cantonese was her first language (her great-great grandparents came to Vancouver during the railway-building era). She practices qi gong, a branch of traditional Chinese medicine that combines massage, acupuncture and at-home exercises, and has recruited qi gong students to volunteer at her events.
6:30PM MacGillivray originally got the idea for Beauty Night as a volunteer at a Downtown Eastside drop-in centre for sex workers. She remembers a client in distress who wasn’t able to lift her arms to do her hair or makeup after showering, so MacGillivray helped the woman feel better about how she looked.
7:15PM Words of encouragement are displayed on sticky notes during a February Beauty Night event at a Union Gospel Mission shelter on East Cordova Street. In addition to beauty treatments, MacGillivray’s organization offers wellness programming and life-skills training sessions.
7:30PM Volunteers like Samantha Tong (pictured above) are at the heart of Beauty Night, but during the pandemic many volunteers moved away from the Vancouver area. MacGillivray says the organization is slowly rebuilding, and they’re looking for hairdressers, fundraisers, grant writers and marketing specialists.
8:10PM The team packs up their supplies at the end of the night. “I think one of the biggest pieces has always been about the community building,” MacGillivray says. She dreams of someday spreading the magic of Beauty Night beyond Vancouver. “My next chapter is to look at sustainability. How do we move forward and heal more people?”
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Between 20 and 25 percent of the world is iron deficient, according to Statistics Canada, and about nine percent of Canadian women between the ages of 20 and 49 are lacking in this important nutrient. Aside from fatigue and weakness, iron deficiency can cause irritability, headaches and dizziness, and cold feet and hands, among other symptoms. Iron deficiency is particularly common for those with heavy periods, or those who are vegetarian or vegan.
I eat tons of leafy greens and meat, but I’ve been iron deficient for decades nonetheless, according to my bloodwork. (I blame heavy periods, or some sort of absorption issue.)
In my perpetual quest to add even more iron to my rotation, I recently tried the Lucky Iron Fish, a fits-in-your-palm piece of metal you place in a pot of water along with a few drops of acidity, such as lemon juice or vinegar, and then boil for 10 minutes. The boiling water releases easily absorbable iron particles from the fish and creates iron-infused water you can use later on (for example, in teas or smoothies, or to cook oatmeal or rice). You can also simply add the Iron Fish to the pot when you’re making things like soup, sauce, curry or pasta. Often, the acidity in the veggies you add, or in the stock or tomato sauce, is enough to release the iron particles.
According to Michelle Cohen, a family physician in Brighton, Ont., who focuses on debunking alternative medicine and wellness trends, using the Lucky Iron Fish isn’t an issue—but it’s also probably not going to make much of a dent if you’re truly iron deficient, like I am. (Without supplementation—a.k.a. iron pills—my ferritin levels hover around 6 or 8, whereas normal levels should be in the 60 to 140 mcg/dL range. My iron levels are too low to donate blood, even.)
The iron fish “can be a helpful tool, but it’s probably not enough supplementation on its own for a large deficiency,” says Cohen. “Cooking in a cast iron pan can help a bit, too. Both are good, passive options to boost dietary iron that are easy on the gut, but they might be better for maintaining already sufficient iron levels or being used in combination with oral supplementation.”
When I discussed my chronic iron issues with Amauri Caversan, a naturopathic doctor in Toronto, he told me the Lucky Iron Fish is not dissimilar from a home remedy in Brazil, where this deficiency is common, especially in impoverished communities. He says families there are sometimes told to put an old rusty nail in their pot of beans as a way to incorporate more iron over time.
According to the manufacturer, the Lucky Iron Fish releases six to eight mg of iron per use, which is about the same as eating an eight-ounce steak or eight cups of raw spinach. But each capsule of FeraMAX, the iron pill brand my doctor recommends, contains a whopping 150 mg of elemental iron: a much heavier dose.
Some people have a hard time taking their iron supplements consistently because the pills can cause constipation, diarrhea, gastric pain, nausea or black or dark-green poop (while that last phenomenon is weird, it’s not actually harmful). Iron supplements also aren’t covered by my insurance, and the ones I use cost about $30 a box, which can also be a deterrent. (Each box lasts me about a month.) The Iron Fish is marketed as a gentler option, with fewer side effects, and it only costs $50. It’s reusable for five years or more.
I did find that the fish rusts easily if you don’t care for it as directed—this was my only complaint. After washing it with soap and water, you must hand-dry it completely. (It will definitely rust if you let it air-dry.) And, after each use, you’ll need to treat the fish with the bottle of “protection oil” it comes with, too. But, apart from that small maintenance effort, it’s small, cute and you can keep it on your counter or stovetop to make it easy to remember to plop it into a dish while cooking, no harm done.
Cohen encouraged me to stick with my FeraMAX iron pills—which give me very few side effects compared to other brands I’ve tried—and she says that anyone who’s iron deficient should experiment with various formulations. “There are lots of different iron supplements out there, so people shouldn’t feel discouraged if one type of iron bothers their gut,” she says.
When Caversan’s clients report that they aren’t tolerating their iron pills well, he suggests trying heme-iron (as opposed to non-heme iron) pills. This may not work for vegans and vegetarians, however: Heme iron is derived from meat, poultry and seafood, whereas non-heme iron is found in plant foods like leafy greens, legumes, nuts, seeds and whole grains.
Cohen advises her patients to take iron on an empty stomach, but with vitamin C—a glass of orange juice is a popular option—to increase absorption. (Taking iron on a fuller stomach will likely mean fewer gastric issues, but it can also lower your absorption rates.) You could ask your doctor about taking an iron pill every other day, she notes, or just a few times a week.
Because I’m being more diligent about my iron pills and trying out the Iron Fish concurrently, it’s hard to evaluate which one is more effective. But I do know that cooking with the fish can’t hurt.
Next: 12 Foods That Are Higher in Iron Than Spinach
On a recent trip to a Sephora store, I was greeted by a sign with the words, “Support skin barrier.” It’s messaging that joins a recent spate of new serums, moisturizers and cleansers all geared towards maintaining, protecting or repairing your skin’s barrier. However loosely you follow skin-care trends, chances are you’ve noticed that this is the latest mission-critical. And it’s left many wondering—this beauty writer included—just what exactly the skin barrier is, and why it’s in need of such support.
Sometimes referred to as the moisture barrier, the skin barrier is another term for the stratum corneum, the outermost layer of the skin. It’s about as thick as a single strand of hair and is the first layer of defense in protecting your skin and your body from the external environment. Toronto-based dermatologist, founding director of the Bay Dermatology Centre and assistant professor at the University of Toronto Dr. Sandy Skotnicki likens the stratum corneum to a brick wall, with the cells being the bricks and the natural oils and ceramides being the mortar. “When you damage your skin barrier, you’re damaging that brick wall. Usually the mortar, which is the natural lipids, are removed,” Skotnicki explains. One common example is when a soap molecule bonds with not only the surface grease you’re trying to remove but also with the skin’s lipid molecules, removing those lipids and leaving holes in the stratum corneum’s brick-and-mortar.
A skin barrier that’s been damaged may demonstrate visual cues like redness and flakiness or sensations like dryness, burning and itching. A minorly damaged skin barrier may not display any symptoms at all. However, this damage can still lead to negative consequences for the skin like inflammation by allowing more UV light and pollution to penetrate the skin’s deeper layers.
There is a litany of ways the skin barrier can become weakened, and it’s not just aggressive cosmetic treatments like weekly chemical peels or nightly retinol applications that are doing you dirty. Skotnicki explains that everything from soap to hot water and even wind can weaken your barrier. “I don’t think the general public knows that the act of washing yourself damages your skin barrier,” Skotnicki says. “Your skin barrier is always [getting] messed up, every time you wash your face. It’s a constant thing.” It’s a phenomenon she examines at length in her 2018 book Beyond Soap: The Real Truth About What You Are Doing to Your Skin and How to Fix It for a Beautiful, Healthy Glow.
To help keep your barrier in tip-top shape, Skotnicki says that moisturizing is the first step. And while all moisturizers will support your skin barrier to some degree, those displaying obvious signs of a weakened barrier (redness, irritation, flaking et cetera) or having skin diseases like eczema, rosacea and dermatitis (which cause an inherently weaker barrier), will want to seek out products with ingredients that more actively repair your barrier, like lipids such as ceramides, and free fatty acids such as linoleic acids. Skotnicki also recommends using moisturizers with ingredients that decrease inflammation and irritation. “When you have a disrupted skin barrier, your skin may be slightly more irritated and inflamed, and [it] can’t hold in water as well because that brick wall is not functioning and that’s why you can get a bit of irritation.”
Also, try using a pH-balanced cleanser (typically, that’s one that’s clear and bubble- and foam-free, and often labelled some variation of “pH balanced”) on your face and body to minimize disruption to the lipids in the stratum corneum and washing in warm, not hot, water. And for those of us who enjoy a more extensive, multi-step skin-care regimen, Skotnicki says that skin cycling may offer some relief. This derm-backed TikTok beauty trend involves the regular application of active ingredients, like alpha hydroxy acid or a retinoid, followed by about two rest days, where no active ingredients are used to allow skin time to recover and maintain a healthy barrier.
At the end of the day, Skotnicki is quick to point out that most of us have skin that’s adept at repairing itself and that much of the skin-barrier buzz is yet another marketing trend. If you follow a simple skin-care routine of washing and moisturizing your skin once or twice a day, Skotnicki says you can rest assured that your skin barrier is probably more than healthy. “Our skin has an incredible ability to buffer itself.”
Our top picks that “support skin barrier”
Three Ships Replenish Ceramides + Blueberry Barrier Repair Serum, $40 at thedetoxmarket.ca
La Roche Posay Lipikar Baume AP+M, $34, shoppersdrugmart.com
Kiehl’s Ultra Facial Advanced Barrier Repair Cream, $55, sephora.ca
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The night I walked into the HMCS Donnacona base—a cavernous, nondescript building just south of downtown Montreal—for my enrolment as a 51-year-old Navy recruit, a well-meaning officer mistakenly offered to escort me to the ceremony room, congratulating me on my child’s recruitment. His eyes widened as I corrected him. He apologized politely, but this was not the last time I would mumble an explanation to a confused stranger under my breath—always some version of “I-know-I-am-old-and-frumpy-and-wearing-a-pink-cardigan-but-I-joined-the-Navy-anyhow”—while somehow both laughing and crying a little bit on the inside.
To be fair, not even I fully believed I should be there. Not at first. Four years earlier, in 2018, I had undergone a preventative double mastectomy. (I didn’t have breast cancer, but it runs in my family and I swore I would do anything I could to prevent it.) After the surgery, it was truly torturous to do any movement that required more upper-body strength than you’d use to open a jar of pickles, so I hadn’t exercised in ages. I had also indulged in a lot of pandemic pizza, packing on what I lovingly referred to as my body’s own weighted comfort blanket.
Two years before that, I had gone through a tricky divorce (is there any other kind?), which left me feeling defeated, depleted and directionless—a ship without a rudder.
I wish I could say it was these huge life changes and a desire to serve my country that led me to the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF), but, if I’m being honest, it had far more to do with my bank account. Single again at mid-life, I was in need of a solid career, preferably one with security and a pension. Enter the Canadian government job site.
As I scrolled through the listings, my eyes would glaze over as words like “data” or “administrative” whipped by. Then I saw something about communications. It went on to mention travel, adventure and a pension. I was intrigued. “Naval Communicators establish and manage all external voice, radio-teletype and data circuits, and provide real-time tactical information in support of operations,” it read.
I focused on the fact that I’m a writer—a professional communicator—who loves information. How hard could this be? I thought, somewhat naively. Only later did I bother reading the fine print about Basic Training, and learn how hard it is to qualify for the job.
For a while, sanity resumed and I went on to apply to a number of landlubbing, pushup-free data admin roles. But something was gnawing away at me, and over the next several weeks I kept clicking back on the original link. What if I told myself I could do this, and believed it? Perhaps it’s a mid-life cliché, but I had just finished reading Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert for the umpteenth time—a book that explores the idea of living a life that is driven by curiosity rather than fear.
I was curious about working for the CAF, which surprised me. I spent ages poring over the website and learning about recent Navy missions, particularly Canada’s humanitarian response to the Syrian refugee crisis. And when I later asked the recruiting officers, in person, about the CAF’s history of racism, misogyny and sexual misconduct, I was surprised at how candid and painstakingly committed they seemed to being more transparent and more inclusive in order to create a safer workplace for all.
(Related: “I’m a 40-Something-Year-Old Skateboarder—and TikTok Sensation”)
To this day, I still wonder why I kept returning to that website. The truest answer I’ve come up with so far is that it made me think, Maybe, when we are feeling helpless, the idea of helping others is all we can cling to.
The next steps were clearly outlined: Apply online, take the aptitude test, meet for a one-on-one interview and then pass the gruelling physical FORCE evaluation. This includes a simulation of real-life scenarios that members of the CAF may find themselves in: things like sandbag hauling, sprints and shuttle runs. Easy-peasy, right?
I took the required time to recover from my mastectomy surgeries (there were three in total) and slowly started training. I bought a few 30-pound bags of rice to use for lifting, sprung for a new pair of trainers, found a deserted indoor parking lot and made a Beyoncé playlist. It felt good to challenge myself physically again and to learn what this new body was capable of. I surprised myself and passed it all, and was offered a job.
I decided to join as a part-time naval communicator reserve, rather than as a full-time member of the force, and will complete the rest of my training concurrently over the next four years. This means I’ll still get the pension and the adventure, but I will also have the flexibility to decide how much time I spend abroad (a choice those in the regular force do not have). Though my sons, aged 20 and 22, are very independent, I’m not ready to live away from them for extended periods yet.
I have already completed the first of the three Basic Training modules remotely (it was a series of online units focused on the mission and ethos of the CAF). The second module, which I’m halfway through, is three months of in-person workshops and drill instruction. Eventually, I’ll head to Quebec City for the final module. This is the one that every army movie depicts: three weeks of climbing, cussing, muddy obstacle courses and marching while carrying a 50-pound backpack, shoulder to shoulder with fellow recruits half my age.
Once completed, I’ll head to the East Coast for the Navy-specific course, and, finally, an eight-week trade-specific course. Members of the Naval Reserves are only required to participate in weekly training at our local bases, though we can elect to do four months of active missions per year. When the timing is right, I’ll have opportunities to explore Canada’s coastlines and travel across the world.
It’s been a year since I enrolled. Though we are a diverse unit—four men, three women, ranging in age from 18 to 51 (me), with varying educational and professional backgrounds—we have quickly learned that we need to share our strengths and skills with one another in order to succeed. If my uniform has a visible wrinkle, we all do pushups. Ditto for not taking an order from a superior fast enough. We have to trust one another and follow our commanding officer without question, which is hard for me—I’ve always resisted authority figures and I question everything. Have you ever met a writer before? I seethed, after I was disciplined for asking too many questions. More pushups.
I started this journey hyper-focused on myself and what I wanted everyone to see: A Strong-Ass Woman Doing Fine On Her Own. I was worried the others would view me as the oldest, weakest link, but the crow’s feet around my eyes and the greys sprinkling my ponytail do not earn me a second of grace from the instructors when it comes to dropping and doing planks. And the punishments—even the pushups—have helped my whole unit develop a keen sense of camaraderie and trust. If we support each other, we do better. If anything, I think me being older, and a mom, has grounded us as a unit. I’m not quite bringing homemade bran muffins to drill practices, but I am often the one encouraging those who are struggling to take a moment and refocus.
Somewhere along the way, I became far more focused on finding my purpose and developing a sense of teamwork—like helping my unit learn how to tie a reef knot properly. (This is a skill my mom actually taught me when I was in Girl Guides, but it’s quite useful in the Navy!) I may not be the cool kid doing one-handed G.I. Jane-style pushups, but I was able to advocate for my entire squad and successfully petition for paid bonus training sessions for all of us.
When I think of my body now, it feels capable and functional. I can run five kilometres without getting winded, and I no longer have to ask one of my sons to open pickle jars for me. And, just last week, my youngest conveniently announced that my not-quite-bulging biceps probably meant I was “all clear” to resume snow-shovelling duties again.
Aside from the physical changes, there have also been smaller, invisible victories: The Navy taught me that my worth and ability to contribute to society in a meaningful way is not tied to my age, my gender or my size. And it also taught me that, even if the direction my life is now taking is not the one I had mapped out one unhappy marriage ago, I am not destined to be lost forever. I’m proud to say I am a Naval Reserves recruit, and I don’t plan to abandon ship any time soon.
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This story is part of Best Health’s Preservation series, which spotlights wellness businesses and practices rooted in culture, community and history.
If your favourite wellness activities include yoga, meditation or using herbs and adaptogens, you’ve already been dabbling in Ayurveda.
Ayurveda is a system of healing that originated in India more than 3,000 years ago. It employs methods such as diet, herbal remedies, yoga and breathing practices to prevent illness and promote balance in the body. One of Ayurveda’s main goals is to discover the root cause of a disease before it progresses, and in India it’s common for people to get treatment for allergies, diabetes and gut issues through an Ayurvedic doctor or practitioner.
Mithalee Rawat, who was born in the Indian city Pune, grew up surrounded by professional and home cooks, eating food that had influences from many different regions of her home country. While her early diet didn’t always conform to traditional Ayurvedic practices, elements of that knowledge seeped into her daily life.
“We didn’t grow up eating Ayurvedic—so much of Indian food isn’t Ayurvedic,” Rawat says. “But if we were sick, the foods our mom gave us would be something that her dad told her is good for the flu.”
When she was 15, Rawat moved with her family to Canada, where she started immersing herself in the culinary world, working as a line cook and later studying culinary arts at the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology. But it wasn’t until she began working at a raw vegan restaurant in Edmonton that she realized how much influence Ayurveda was having on the mostly white clientele.
“All of these people knew so much more about Ayurvedic herbs than I did. That’s when I realized that what South Asian people have been doing for a long time is now being marketed in a new age-y way,” Rawat says. “I joke that Ayurveda is the longest clinical trial in the world, since it has been practiced over thousands of years and has been proven incredibly effective.”
Rawat began to learn more about the practice and, in 2018, she launched Shorba Bone Broth, an Ayurveda-inspired bone broth company.
Shorba uses bones from locally sourced, grass-fed beef and free-run chicken to make shorba, which means broth or soup in several languages, including Hindi, Arabic, Turkish and Bulgarian. The company offers a four- or seven-day Reset program, consisting of bone broth and khichari, a rice and lentil dish based on simple and easily digestible ingredients.
After noticing that western-style bone broth, usually made with aromatics, was being marketed for good gut health, Rawat used her knowledge of Ayurveda to create a bone broth recipe that avoided ingredients like onions or garlic, which are not considered suitable for sensitive stomachs. Shorba products, such as the 48-Hour Beef Broth with Ayurvedic Elixir and the 24-Hour Chicken Bone Broth with Ayurvedic Elixir, use a blend of organic spices like ginger, turmeric root, black peppercorns, bay leaves and other medicinal ingredients. Simmering the bones in these spices amplifies the benefits of the broth, and is said to contain anti-inflammatory properties and support gut health.
Bone broth also contains essential minerals like calcium, magnesium and potassium, plus collagen, which strengthens your hair, nails and bones. Collagen also contains amino acids that help hold your tissues, muscles and joints together.
Ayurvedic teachings were part of the backdrop to Rawat’s upbringing, but the wider wellness industry too often centres white practitioners appropriating cultural knowledge over the people of colour who are the holders of that ancestral knowledge. It’s something that Rawat says can’t be ignored. “If they are white, they should be acknowledging the original source and knowledge of the wisdom, and ensuring the people and the land that it comes from are also benefiting from the commercialization of it. It must be empowering for the cultures whose ancestral teachings are being used.”
As her business continues to grow alongside the interest in eastern wellness practices, Rawat is hoping to see more respect from wellness practitioners. “There are ways for white people to appreciate cultures and foods without feeling entitled to them. Ayurveda is for everyone and these foods are for everyone, but presenting non-Asians as experts of Asian medicine is a problematic dynamic.”
This story is part of Best Health’s Preservation series, which spotlights wellness businesses and practices rooted in culture, community and history. Read more from this series here:
Meet Sisters Sage, an Indigenous Wellness Brand Reclaiming Smudging
Have Super Dry Skin? This Canadian Skincare Company Is Here to Help
This Soap Brand Is Sharing the Healing Power of Inuit Tradition
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One of the most commonly used tools for at-home spa treatments (and pedicures in particular) is a pumice stone. You’ve probably seen one of these—might’ve even used one without being entirely sure what it is.
Turns out, the miracle foot tool is actually a volcanic rock. “A pumice stone is a natural stone that was created by the union of water and lava. The boiling lava cooled when water mixed into it, releasing gases that created a slab with holes,” explains Natalie Aguilar, a dermatological nurse and celebrity aesthetician. “They come in many shapes and sizes and have multiple household uses, from body care to scrubbing grease off a stove.”
“It’s great that people are starting to pay more attention to their feet,” Correa says. “It’s important, however, to make sure they are getting the proper education on the dos and don’ts.” (More on those later.)
Here, everything you need to know about this handy little foot tool.
What to look for when buying a pumice stone
The first thing to know is that different types of pumice stones have different uses. “A flatter stone is best used for larger areas, while a round stone works best to contour certain edges, like the side of the foot,” says celebrity manicurist Deborah Lippmann. “I find that a stone with a handle really helps with the hard-to-reach areas and is also great for the nail beds and cuticle area. Stones that have a rough and smooth side allow you to scrub and smooth with one tool.”
Celeste Hilling, founder and CEO of skin care company Skin Authority, says that most stones purchased through a beauty supply store or drugstore are fine. “We usually recommend a double-sided stone, which has a rougher side as well as a smoother side, so you can vary pressure and resurfacing based on the area of the feet,” she says.
Some pedicurists prefer using natural stones. “Not only is it better for the environment, I find they work better,” says Amber Johnson, an aesthetician and founder of Facial Lounge, a spa in Corona Del Mar, California.
(Related: 8 Homemade Foot Scrub Recipes to Pamper Tired Feet)
How to use a pumice stone
“Pumice stones are a preferred option for at-home use in the shower or bath to alleviate dry, calloused feet and toes,” says Tia Delponte, owner of Tia’s Corner and an aesthetician at Color Up Wellness Center. She recommends using a hard pumice stone to smooth the cracked and scaly areas of the feet. For the bottom of the feet and the tips of the toes, she prefers a softer pumice.
The key is to soak your feet first. That’ll soften your skin enough that you can slough off dead cells—without hurting your foot. “The reason most nail salons soak the feet is to remove hardened skin that forms on the bottom and sides of our feet easily, and without hurting the skin or causing pain,” Correa says. Many nail salons opt for pumice stones over metal graters, says Correa. They’re gentler on your skin, whereas metal graters can cause cuts and lesions to the feet when used improperly.
Potential dangers
“I love a great pumice stone because it’s a simple and effective way to get rid of dead skin,” says Lippmann. “As long as you exercise caution when using them, they are safe.” The caution part of her statement? Yeah, that’s important. Though pumice stones are often safe for most people, there are a few issues you need to be aware of.
Bacteria
As much as you want smooth feet, you probably aren’t too keen on introducing bacteria to your skin in the process. So the golden rule of using a pumice stone: clean it! (More on how to clean it later.) If you don’t properly clean your stone, it can breed bacteria, says Delponte. “The biggest concern with using a pumice stone is making sure that it doesn’t collect bacteria,” she says. “It’s important to clean after every use with a scrub brush and leave the pumice stone out to dry in between uses.” Sharing a pumice stone with another person (a big no-no) is another way you increase the chances of bacterial growth.
Pumice burn
Lippmann cautions against overusing pumice stones—you might remove too much skin. Delponte agrees, saying over-exfoliation can have some pretty painful consequences. “When that happens, it is called ‘pumice burn’ and will leave your skin exposed and tender, creating pain while walking,” she says. The best way to use a pumice stone is lightly (there’s no need to scrub like you’re scouring a food-crusted cooking dish) and more often.
Scratches and tears
Be mindful about where you use the pumice stone. Steer clear of soft skin, like the stuff on the top of your foot, your toes, and the ball of your foot. In general, if your feet are sensitive or have thinner skin, you should be cautious, says Peterson Pierre, MD, a dermatologist and founder of the Pierre Skincare Institute.
“Pumice stones should never be used on areas of thin skin,” he says. “You should focus primarily on calluses and corns typically found on hands and feet. There’s no point in being overly aggressive: it won’t make your results any better, and you may cause wounds if you’re not careful.” You can also harm your skin by using it improperly. “Using a pumice stone dry may damage your skin,” she says. It’s best to use a pumice stone after a bath or shower, when your feet are wet.
Certain medical conditions
Hilling warns that people with certain conditions should avoid pumice stones. “When used correctly, pumice stones are generally safe,” she says. “However, we don’t recommend use for anyone who is on blood thinners, has diabetic ulcerations, or [has] poor circulation. These conditions make someone more susceptible to bleeding or an infection as a result of use.”
In fact, some medical doctors say people with diabetes (whether or not they have foot ulcers) should avoid foot exfoliation altogether. And definitely skip this tool if you have nerve damage or a loss of sensation in your feet. If you have numbness, Hilling says, you may not feel the pressure. That can cause you to rub too deeply and injure your skin.
Don’t use a pumice stone (or any other exfoliator) over cuts, scrapes, or other wounds. “You should avoid any areas with lesions [or] ulcers,” says Hilling. “You also want to avoid cuts or other areas which can get infected.” Instead, Hilling recommends a leave-on peel that will dissolve layers of dead skin.
Where to use a pumice stone on your foot
If your feet have patches of dry, thickened skin, a pumice stone may be just what you need. It’s particularly effective at removing rough patches of skin, such as the stuff that tends to form on the heels. “It’s best to use it on thicker skin, like calluses,” says Johnson.
How to use a pumice stone
First things first: Make sure your pumice stone is thoroughly clean, says Lippmann. Wet the stone (or let it soak in warm water while you’re soaking your feet). “We always recommend to never use the stone dry,” says Hilling. From there, follow these steps:
- Soak your feet in lukewarm water for five to 10 minutes. (Or exfoliate after a bath or shower.)
- Remove your feet. Pat them dry.
- Apply the wet stone to the area. Using light pressure, rub in a circular motion until you see the dry skin removed.
- Rinse your feet, then pat them dry.
- Apply a moisturizer (Hilling suggests an alpha hydroxy acid cream; Johnson loves lanolin moisturizers) or moisturizing oil to maintain softness.
- Wash your pumice stone, then lay it out to dry.
“You can repeat the steps a couple of days in a row until you get to the smoothness level, and then once a week to maintain,” says Hilling.
How should you care for the pumice stone?
By following these simple tricks, you can make sure your pumice stone stays clean and doesn’t transfer bacteria to your feet.
Store it properly
Think of the darker corners of your shower and how they begin to mildew if you don’t keep them clean. Your pumice stone has the same bacteria-breeding potential, so don’t leave it in the shower. “Every stone has a different protocol to disinfect. I tell people not to keep the stones in a dark, wet place like the shower,” Johnson says. Instead, store your stone in a dry place.
Clean it thoroughly
There are different ways to clean your pumice stone, but the most important thing is that you do it every time you use it. Skip cleanings, and your stone can breed bacteria. “It’s really important to always clean it after every use since bacteria can grow on the surface of the stone,” says Lippmann. “A bristle brush is a great way to scrub dead skin off the stone, but do so under running water and with a little soap.” Hilling likes to clean her stones after each use with an antibacterial cleanser.
Want a deeper clean? Delponte recommends spraying pumice stones with 70 percent alcohol to make sure there is no chance of bacterial growth. Or try Lippman’s deep-cleaning tactic: “Boil your pumice stone in hot water for five minutes,” she says. Johnson uses this method, too, but she says it’s important to follow the directions of the brand you bought. Once your stone is clean, let it air dry completely before reusing. Only once it’s completely dry can it be stored in a dry, closed area.
Replace it regularly
“Pumice stones will wear down over time, becoming too smooth to remain effective,” says Lippmann. “If your stone becomes too small, smooth, or soft, replace it.” And while you and your partner might share everything from jokes to shampoo, this shouldn’t apply to pumice stones. “Do not share your pumice with other people!” Lippman says.
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At around twelve or thirteen years old, Taslim began developing crushes on boys in her class, though they never lasted long. Taslim knew there was no way she could get away with having an actual boyfriend. She couldn’t risk getting caught and knew better than to trust anyone at school. “I had a friend who was Indian Muslim, same age as me, and she had a boyfriend, and another girl from a very conservative family told on her and tried to get her in trouble.” She knew that they were being watched by adults most of the time, even while they socialized. Taslim used to go to the mall, a seven-minute walk from school, always in a group in case there was an auntie there who would report back to her parents. She once got in trouble for walking home with a neighbour simply because he was a boy.
At the time, there were unsettling stories circulating about other Muslim girls. One involved a distant relative of Taslim, a second or third cousin, now in her fifties, who was pulled out of school. Taslim was told it was because her cousin’s older brother graduated from high school and their parents didn’t want her there alone. Taslim later learned the truth was the cousin’s parents caught her with a boyfriend. “So, I think for me, school was also this place where you can kind of fuck up and be pulled out and then your whole life is, like, compromised, because what can you do if you don’t have school? You’re dependent.” And being dependent was Taslim’s biggest fear.
These types of anecdotes ingrained in her a deep apprehension of disappointing her parents. For as long as she can remember, Taslim has erred on the side of caution. “I’m a bureaucrat, so that makes me even more risk-averse. It’s like a circle,” she says. “You’re risk-averse, so you end up in a risk-averse job, and then you become more risk-averse.”
Boys weren’t allowed to call her at home, either, even to ask about homework. In an eleventh-grade physics class, Taslim was the only girl in her lab group and had to get creative in order to receive calls from the boys. She and her girlfriends, who also came from conservative families, came up with strategies to get access to the landline and talk to their male classmates. “I would tell the boy to call me at a certain time and I’d pick up the phone. We’d have these little tricks. Another girl-friend of mine, who had the same problem, would get the guy’s sister to call and then the guy would come on the phone,” she says with a chuckle. Taslim had friends who were boys, but these friendships remained within the confines of school grounds.
There was also a certain amount of embarrassment that came with participating in social events outside of school. Rarely did her parents let her go to parties, and if they did, they chaperoned. Farida once came along to a friend’s birthday party at a restaurant. “You’re almost like, ‘I’ll just be a hermit because it’s less embarrassing,’” she says and laughs. Living within this framework, Taslim always felt controlled. She remembers often crying herself to sleep at night, wanting more than what was allowed. Her best friends were a mix of Jewish, Chinese, and Indian Muslim girls whose parents also had strict rules for them, even if they weren’t necessarily religious. The ones who did have boyfriends did so secretly. None, to Taslim’s knowledge, were having sex. By the end of high school, Taslim had resolved to excel her way out. “I was going to do well in university and get a job and be independent. And I really put my eggs in that basket.” She refused to let herself be distracted by falling in love or forming lasting friendships. “I wanted to make sure I could make decisions, because I was scared I was going to have to marry someone right after university, or before, or whatever. That was the reality for me and for a lot of girls of my generation in that community,” she says. She remembers always operating with an underlying fear that at any moment, if she didn’t behave as she was expected to, life-altering decisions would be made for her.
Things didn’t change very much for Taslim during her university studies in Montreal, as she continued living at home with her parents. She had a new schedule, of course, and her classes were all over campus, which made keeping track of her harder for her parents. But she never took advantage of this; she was always where she told them she would be. There were opportunities to develop friendships and a social life, but she was laser-focused on her BA, with the goal of then moving out of her parents’ house.
Only after landing a prestigious position in the public sector in Ottawa, at age twenty-five, was Taslim able to leave her native Montreal and parents’ home to live on her own for the first time. It wasn’t terribly difficult getting Imran and Farida on board, however. They were proud of her career development and the good salary it provided in the nation’s capital; they accepted that she had to move away. Her success made it a little easier for them to swat away the occasional criticism they received from community members and extended family about their daughter’s Westernized lifestyle as an independent single woman. In any case, they kept an eye on her. “They make sure I call every day,” she tells me. “There’s still a lot of control, like, ‘What are you doing? Where have you been?’ They know where I am and what I’m doing almost all the time.”
In many ways, Taslim had a new life that she was very pleased with—privacy in her personal affairs, respect at work. For nearly the first two years in Ottawa, Taslim had a roommate, which was a learning experience. “She was a really conservative Muslim, a white convert and super religious. She wouldn’t even wear heels or open-toed shoes. She’d never wear pants, because pants show your contours and skirts are more modest,” she tells me with mild amusement. This was not the open-minded environment Taslim was looking for. She found herself an apartment she could afford on her own.
Although Taslim has never been very social, she’s made a few friends in Ottawa and has dated a few men. First, there was Paul, a Vietnamese British man, with whom she spent five years. Although she wasn’t in love, she grew accustomed to Paul and had feelings of love for him. “We didn’t have a physical relationship,” she says, “but we were dating for that many years. That was pretty serious.” The relationship ended for a couple reasons. Paul was younger than Taslim, and she felt as though he was still growing up. His parents lived in Ottawa, and he saw them all the time. Although Taslim respected his mother, a highly educated and self-made immigrant, the dynamic was off. “I felt like she babied her son, and she was kind of expecting me to make him a grown-up. I knew I couldn’t really do that for somebody else.”
The fact that Taslim wasn’t having sex with Paul wasn’t a problem in the beginning. They held hands, kissed, and made out. But that was it. “I know he wanted to. He did try to initiate it, and then he would stop because he knew I had a line that I wouldn’t cross.” Her body language was always clear, and if he didn’t understand it, she would gently push him off her. Her libido is low in general, and she doesn’t know why that is. It could be the medication she’s on for her underactive thyroid, which is linked to a low sex drive and arousal issues. Or it could be a remnant of growing up in her Pakistani household. She concedes it could also be a mix of the two.
Taslim, who remains a virgin, tells me that the thought of sex scares her. She’s aware there could be a psychosocial element at play here. Her mind is filled with thoughts of doing “the right thing” in order to be the person her parents expect her to be, which includes being a virgin until marriage. It’s possible it’s just the way she is. “I know I’m straight, but I think there’s an asexual aspect to myself… I haven’t had intercourse, and it’s not something I really want to do. I’m not drawn to it.”
She and Paul had conversations on the subject, and although she isn’t sure he understood completely, he accepted things for a while. “He knew that I felt like I couldn’t.” In time, it became enough of an issue that it was partly why the relationship didn’t work out. On a handful of occasions, she’s almost had sex, but she never truly wanted to.
The first of these instances she describes almost as assault. Taslim was twenty-nine and was going on dates again after her breakup with Paul. “I don’t remember all of it. I wasn’t drunk or anything like that; I just can’t remember parts of it,” she says. At the end of this first date, she went back with this man to his apartment, something she wasn’t sure she wanted to do. He began “trying to do things I didn’t want him to do.” She remembers fragments: sitting on his couch, being on his bed, the time on his alarm clock reading nine-something, his being very close to her and breathing heavily. But nothing much in between comes back to her. “I remember saying, ‘I want to go.’ And I sat in the car crying. I was very upset. And then he said, ‘You’re like a two-year-old,’ in front of my condo.” He was angry and claimed she’d led him on. Taslim cried about this uncomfortable experience for a few days, confused about whether she was responsible for how things went that night. But even in other situations that weren’t scary or unpleasant, she still always pulled away and froze up.
For a few months, Taslim dated Karim, a Moroccan Korean, before figuring out that he was still in love with his ex. She tried dating within her ethnic community, though one date with a South Asian man left a bad taste in her mouth. “He complimented me on my skin tone. Because in my culture, it’s a compliment to comment on someone’s lighter complexion,” she says and shakes her head. “Which is pretty sickening.” Most of the South Asian men she meets are Hindu rather than Muslim anyway, she explains. “I’m sure they wouldn’t go there, because it would be a big issue for them too.”
She’s firm about not accepting help finding a partner from her family or community. She doesn’t want to be set up on blind dates. The fact that she’s so private and introverted makes it harder for her to consider this traditional form of dating. “I don’t trust people in the community. I don’t want people to know anything about me.” Once, long ago, an informal auntie sent Taslim’s mother a photograph of a young man who lived in the city. “And I was like, ‘What am I supposed to do?’ Some random picture of some random person,” she scoffs. The idea of meeting a stranger based on an auntie’s recommendation almost offends her. Taslim’s stubbornness on this matter was a point of frustration with Farida for many years. After trying to pressure her into it, she gave up. Taslim staunchly prefers meeting men on her own. “If there’s someone, there’s someone,” Taslim says with a shrug.
The year after things ended with Paul, Taslim met Tom. They worked in the same office, doing similar work in different departments, and slowly built a platonic friendship. After Tom’s contract was up, they went for dinner and began to pursue a romantic relationship. Even with Tom—who was loving, patient, and committed to her—Taslim couldn’t bring herself to have intercourse. The conversation came up a lot: Tom wanted to have a sexual relationship, as well as children, with Taslim. While he understood her strict religious background, the fact that her sexual desire for him was low remained very frustrating for him, especially five years in. But there was little that Taslim could do about it; her sex drive wasn’t improving, and her comfort level with having sex wasn’t changing.
The couple had separate apartments for most of their relationship, but in the fourth year, Tom moved into hers. They decided to give building a life together a real shot. But living with a lover without a sexual component isn’t easy to navigate, Taslim acknowledges. They had to come up with their own rules, negotiate comfort levels, and communicate a lot. On their therapist’s suggestion, they tried taking showers together as a form of intimacy. Taslim didn’t enjoy it. “I just felt it was uncomfortable and claustrophobic. I felt anxious.” They cuddled in bed and slept together, unless he snored and she kicked him out, she tells me with a laugh. The furthest they ever went was oral sex. Taslim didn’t feel attracted enough to the idea of reciprocating, but Tom performed it on her a handful of times. “My body obviously enjoyed it. I don’t know mentally if I responded to it because I felt disconnected. I felt like it was happening to me. I knew it was happening to me. But I was not in it. I didn’t really feel present,” she says.
It reminded her of how sexual activities felt with Paul. Although he never pushed her to do anything she didn’t want to do, whenever things turned sexual, she would have a visceral pullback reaction. “Like I’d touched something hot, and I’m like, ‘Whoa!’” Although Taslim never felt the urge to have sex while sleeping in the same bed as Tom, she thought a lot about it. “Like, we should be doing this—we have a good relationship, we like each other, we connect mentally. I always felt like there was a wall,” she says, “something that keeps us not really fully feeling like we’re a unit together.” Even when they kissed, she would feel some reluctance in her, some distance.
How did Tom feel about not having intercourse—a cornerstone of heterosexual sex—with the woman he’d been in a loving relationship with for years? It was hard for him to fully accept it, Taslim shares. It wore him down and made him sad. He accused her of seeing him only as a friend. In couples therapy, the idea came up that Taslim is resistant. “It’s been hard for us to deal with that—it’s been eating away at us.”
Tom tried to remain empathetic and understand that this is bigger than Taslim—to understand that she’s trying to go against an entire religious system. “It has nothing to do with him and everything to do with me,” Taslim laments. “He knows that my parents have been strict. That I had a conservative code for what was okay or not in my interactions with men, what I could wear, who I could see, where I could go, who I could go with. He knows all those restrictions, and that in my head I still have all those limitations even though I have the freedom that I never had for many years. He knows I still feel like I’m in a cage.”
—
The breaking point came when Taslim’s parents met Tom. Around her birthday, the year that Tom moved in with Taslim, Farida and Imran were visiting their daughter for the day when Taslim decided it was time to introduce Tom. But Taslim’s parents were too angry and upset to even shake his hand. “They were pretty shocked and taken aback,” Taslim tells me. There was a lot of yelling and screaming—“Who is he? He’s not Muslim!”—directed at both of them. Taslim began to cry. The yelling was mostly in English, but Urdu was peppered throughout. Tom tried to explain how much he cared for and loved Taslim. Farida and Imran wouldn’t listen. Farida decided that Tom must be using Taslim for money. Imran, on the other hand, was just very disappointed. “I felt like my parents kind of violated my boundaries. They went through stuff, went through my closet.” They saw that Tom’s belongings were everywhere before Taslim even had a chance to explain that she’d asked him to live with her. Taslim’s parents demanded that she break up with Tom. Imran even came back to make sure he’d moved out of her apartment.
Tom, who hails from Vancouver, is a white man roughly twenty years older than Taslim and a divorcee. Most importantly to her parents, he’s not Muslim. None of this mattered to Taslim. For a long time, she considered marrying him; there’s a local imam in Ottawa willing to marry Muslim women and non-Muslim men. In Islamic jurisprudence, a Muslim man has the right to marry a non-Muslim woman but not the other way around. This precept operates on the understanding that in addition to the faith passing on from the paternal side, men have the necessary authority to convert their non-Muslim women, or at the very least guarantee raising Muslim children.
“I have a friend who did that. She’s in a common-law relationship with a non-Muslim man, and she reached out to that imam,” Taslim says. She takes comfort knowing she’s not the only Muslim woman to have a relationship with a non-Muslim man in her community. She asked this progressive imam to provide her with supporting material or information regarding this law that she could use to sway her parents. “I’m trying to become more assertive about this,” she says with a timid smile.
But after the meeting with Taslim’s parents, the couple is no longer planning to get married. Tom moved to Taslim’s old condo—which she still owns and was renting out—while they figured out their next move. “It’s kind of a haze, because it was such a difficult experience. It was insane. I got so traumatized, and then I felt—I don’t think this is necessarily true, this is the way I see things—like maybe Tom wasn’t as strong for me as he could have been. I felt alone on this little boat, in the middle of the ocean, trying to defend this whole thing.”
Taslim wants the tension to be over, not the relationship. But doubt has taken root in her. “We’re in a strange place,” she explains. “Things got really tense between us. I felt very tense with him around.” Taslim realized that for her own mental well-being, she needed to pull back and prioritize herself. She needed to figure things out, including if she could ever stand up to her parents or if her relationship with Tom was worth that. “I think my parents really gave me a lot of anxiety and depression over it.” Being pulled in two different directions by the most important people in her life was very stressful for Taslim. Indecision was paralyzing her, and she could no longer decipher what her feelings were, distinct from those of Tom and her parents. Distance was the only way she could cope.
“But ever since the pandemic hit, he’s been here more often than not. Because he’s been my one-person-you-can-see kind of person,” she says. She’s only been to see her parents in Montreal a handful of times since the onset of COVID-19. She describes her relationship with Tom now as in a limbo stage. “We’re not together, but we’re kind of together.” Protecting herself in this way has led to many days of loneliness, and the social distancing rules of the pandemic have only heightened that feeling. She hasn’t been maintaining her friendships, which tend to have boundaries. Only when things are dire does she open up about her personal life to friends. Although Taslim does respond to those who reach out, she admits, “I don’t feel the same closeness. I don’t know what’s going to happen with some friendships.” As a naturally very, very internal person, she finds it difficult to share things with people. She doesn’t see the value in it either—after all, her problems are her problems, and no one is going to solve them for her. And even at work, connections don’t come easy. Two weeks into the pandemic, she began a new job and to this day hasn’t met any of her colleagues in person. “It’s just constant alienation.”
Some days, she considers giving her relationship with Tom another go. But they had other obstacles beyond her parents: their age gap, his finances. She remembers these things and reverts to not being ready for change. “There are times when I feel buoyed by him, but there are times when I feel depleted. My parents have . . . I still have so much fear in my head about the whole thing.” After the blowout with her parents, Taslim couldn’t make personal decisions with conviction. Roughly two years later, she hasn’t completely recovered her self-confidence.
Even talking about the memory triggers her body to tense up. “It’s just like a paralysis. Like suddenly you’re being railroaded. And I know Tom felt that too. He was shocked that it was that kind of reaction.” Taslim believes her parents were deeply ashamed that she had chosen a non-Muslim partner and was living with him outside of wedlock. Taslim tells me that during the blow-up she volunteered information about her virginity, wanting to beat them to the punch. “I told them that I hadn’t. I just said that of my own volition.” She knew where the conversation was headed.
“I definitely have some anger and resentment. I’m trying not to, because I’d rather take that energy and push through and do something for myself that’s better. Everyone’s a product of their environment, circumstances, upbringing. But it’s difficult. Especially with the sexuality side of it.” To cope with the stress of her personal life, Taslim has thrown herself further into her job, working for nearly twelve-hour stretches. “It was crazy, but I think it saved me from dealing with my parents.”
Although she and Tom are still officially broken up, Taslim doesn’t want her parents to visit. Tom occasionally stays over and some of his things are still around. Her brother, Atiq, also believes she was lost in this inter-faith relationship and not thinking logically. “No one in my family supports me,” she says. So the pandemic, which has kept her family away in Montreal, continues to serve as a boundary.
Excerpted from Halal Sex by Sheima Benembarek. Copyright © 2023 Sheima Benembarek. Published by Viking Canada, a division of Penguin Random House Canada Limited. Reproduced by arrangement with the Publisher. All rights reserved.
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With Canada’s health care system in such disarray, it might be time to call in the machines. Currently, there are more than 300 homegrown startups working on health innovations fuelled by artificial intelligence, from smartphone tools that judge the severity of a wound to a handheld digital device that detects cardiac disease to a platform that predicts the global spread of viruses like COVID and monkeypox. While most of these systems aren’t ready for rollout quite yet—though in some Toronto hospitals, AI is already flagging at-risk patients who may require a transfer to the ICU—they’re poised to make a big impact in health care soon.
To better understand what this future could look like, we spoke with Azra Dhalla, the Director of Health AI Implementation at Toronto’s Vector Institute for Artificial Intelligence. “AI has tremendous capabilities, but its transformative powers have yet to be fully realized in health, and that’s what we’re trying to change,” she says. “So we’re working with hospitals, health care agencies and academia to take this world-class research and translate it into something that’s really tangible.” Here, Dhalla discusses AI’s potential to bring hospital wait times way down, the need for more diverse health data and why a robot probably won’t be the one tinkering with your wonky knee.
Before we get to the future of health care, are there places where AI is already being used in medicine?
Yes. There’s ChartWatch, which focuses on predictive analytics. It’s an early-warning system that pulls vitals from patients in the internal-medicine ward to predict whether a transfer to the ICU or a death will occur. So the predictive power of these solutions can really lead to improved decision-making and the ability to intervene early.
What about other AI models working away in the background?
There are some, but I would say that in health care, very few models have been deployed in a clinical setting. Health care has a number of challenges, especially when we’re dealing with data—we have to be very stringent about security, about privacy, about confidentiality. The thing with AI algorithms is that, similar to how you and I learn, AI algorithms get better as more data is provided. But that can only happen if we can actually get access to it, which is very difficult in health care. However, we’ve partnered with Gemini, a data collaborative of more than 30 hospitals’ data in Ontario, the largest of its kind in Canada, and that’s allowed Vector researchers to develop cutting-edge AI models and solutions, including studies related to COVID-19.
What are some of those projects in development right now?
I’d say there are three areas worth highlighting: personalized medicine, drug discovery and creating a more efficient health system. With personalized medicine, algorithms can help us predict illness and support patients long-term. So, for example, you can use AI to predict Alzheimer’s disease based on changes to speech patterns. Or you could use it to discover insights within imaging data that can guide treatment and therapy decisions for patients with breast cancer. With drug discovery, AI can analyze pharmacological and health data to find different combinations of drugs that can be used to target existing and emerging viruses, or treat conditions that the drug might not have originally been prescribed for. And with health systems, it could help alleviate wait times faced by patients in hospitals, which is a big issue in Canada right now. When you bring in AI, the potential for us to better allocate resources, both in terms of staffing and funding, is fantastic and leads to better patient outcomes.
On the other hand, what isn’t going to happen with AI and health care? You must hear some pretty wild theories when people find out what you do.
One thing is that AI is not going to replace a physician—it will augment clinical decision-making, but it won’t replace it. It’s more like a virtual second opinion, not meant to override human judgement or expertise.
So I’m not going to roll up for knee surgery and find a robot about to perform it on me?
Well—I can’t predict the future. But I don’t think that’s going to happen.
What do you hear from doctors and health care practitioners when you talk to them about AI?
They really do want to know how we’re using AI to revolutionize health care, and they want to know not just on a theoretical level but a practical level. How can they use these solutions in a clinical setting? What does it mean for patient care overall? That’s always their number-one question—well, actually, I’ll say there are two questions. Number one, will it be disruptive to my workflow? And the second is, what are the outcomes that can be produced for a patient?
What worries them about their workflow?
What they say is: We don’t want another button to press. We want it to be very seamless. And also they worry whether this all happens in a black box. Explainability in AI is very important—we don’t want to just use this blindly. So if an algorithm makes some kind of decision, we need to know how it has actually come up with that decision.
We hear a lot about bias in AI. How can bias skew an algorithm’s results?
You hear the expression “garbage in, garbage out.” AI algorithms will always reinforce bias if the data they’re trained on is biased. If we’re looking at a pool of health care data that is only representative of a certain segment of the population—
Say, white men of a certain age?
That’s right. Then when you try to apply the AI model to a different or a more diverse population segment, it doesn’t work, or it won’t work in the same way. A good example is an image-recognition model that wasn’t able to recognize melanoma in patients with different skin types, because the model wasn’t trained on data that was representative of the whole population. I will say that there’s much work being done on responsible AI, making sure that we correct for inherent biases.
And how do we do that?
By ensuring that there’s access to very diverse data. And then by looking at that data to really say when it isn’t representative of an entire population, so that if there are inherent biases, we can correct that at the forefront. We also want to make sure our models work for everyone. So in AI implementation, we do these silent trials, where we test out the solution in, say, a hospital, before it goes into practice. Because we don’t want to just say, hey, this tool works fantastically, we’re gonna implement it now. Being able to pilot it is extremely important.
People are understandably quite anxious about the state of Canadian health care. What do you see as the potential for these AI programs, whenever they do get rolled out?
I truly believe that AI has transformative benefits for patients. There is a machine learning model that can create radiation therapy treatment plans for patients with prostate cancer. That can take a clinician more than a day to develop, and the model produces plans within hours that are deemed to be as good as or even better, nine times out of 10. If I were a patient, this is exactly what I’d want: something that creates efficiencies and frees up resources so that I not only have a personalized treatment plan sooner—but I get to spend more time with my physician. That’s extremely beneficial to a patient’s quality of life and the quality of care they receive.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
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One ingredient dermatologists consistently tout is vitamin C. It’s adored for its ability to support collagen production, brighten dark spots, and prevent UVA/UVB damage, making it the gold standard of skin-care ingredients.
“Vitamin C acts as sort of a line of defense against sun damage,” says Julia Carroll certified dermatologist at Compass Dermatology. Even if you’ve applied sunscreen (which, as any derm will preach, should be applied every single day), some ultraviolet light from the sun can still get through to your skin. This creates something called “reactive oxygen species” or “free radicals,” says Carroll, which damage the skin’s DNA. Vitamin C can help counteract that. “So, it’s beneficial in terms of photoprotection,” says Carroll, as it helps to prevent future damage—but also helps correct it.
Vitamin C decreases pigmentation, says Carroll, and since it aids in collagen production, it also helps to reduce the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles. “Most of patients find the texture of their skin improves, and they get a bit more that glow that they’re looking for,” says Carroll.
Here, everything you need to know about choosing the right vitamin C serum for your skin, and how to apply it.
(Related: 6 Drugstore Vitamin C Serums That Are Actually Amazing)
Can anyone use vitamin C?
Carroll says it’s one of her go-tos in terms of recommendations for clients—but it may not be the best option for those with particularly sensitive skin. “I don’t recommend it to everybody because for some people it’s a little bit irritating,” says Carroll. In those cases, she’ll suggest other products, depending on her clients’ needs, that can offer similar protection and benefits.
When should it be applied?
Apply it in the morning, and follow with sunscreen—but if you prefer applying it at night, your skin will still reap the benefits. “A lot of the vitamin C serums have what’s called a ‘reservoir effect,’” meaning they can last up to 72 hours. “If you put it on at night, you would still be reaping the benefits the next day,” says Carroll.
How should it be applied?
Apply four to five drops on clean, dry skin. Prevent potentially wasting the product by using the dropper to drop the serum directly onto your face—one drop on the the forehead, one on each cheek, and one on the chin, and rubbing in. “I might go back and touch up a certain area, and then I’ll run it down my neck as well the chest,” says Carroll. Alternatively, you can drop it onto your fingertips, which are less absorbent than the palms of hands, and apply it that way.
How do you choose the best one for you?
“Look for ones that have L-Ascorbic acid,” says Carroll. “You really want to look for that specific molecule [as opposed to just “ascorbic acid’] because we know that that molecule can penetrate the skin.” Also, look for a concentration between 10 to 20 percent. “If it’s under 10 percent, it’s likely not effective, and if it’s over 20 percent it’s just wasteful.” Packaging is also important. Choose one that comes in an opaque or dark bottle, to prevent oxidization, says Carroll.
What are the best ones?
C E Peptides by Vivier is “a great vitamin C serum but it also has the addition of peptides [which help firm skin], so it’s more of an all-in-one product,” says Carroll. If pigmentation is a concern, Carroll recommends Phloretin CF by SkinCeuticals. If you have oily skin and acne is also a concern, she suggests Silymarin CF by SkinCeuticals, which is the brand’s newest vitamin C serum. “In it, vitamin C is combined with salicylic acid, which helps clogged pores,” says Carroll. Have dry skin and acne? Try Pro-Heal Serum Advance by iS Clinical.
Is there a budget-friendly option?
“If there were a product out there that was extremely inexpensive, I don’t think that you’d get the percentages that would be the equivalent to what you’d see in the higher-end ones,” says Carroll. Some brands can be deceptive with their marketing and even their ingredients list, so Carroll suggests investing in one of high quality. “My three non-negotiables are always sunscreen, topical vitamin C, and some type of retinoid,” she says.
Is there anything to know before applying it?
Be careful with what you pair with vitamin C. “I wouldn’t put it on at the same time as say a retinoid or glycolic acid,” says Carroll. “You don’t want too many active ingredients at one time because they can cancel each other out—or it can just be too much for your skin to handle.”
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I grew up eating Brussels sprouts that had been boiled to an anemic state, each with a deep “X” cut into its base. It wasn’t until I was a student in New York and tried my first deep-fried Brussels sprout at a David Chang restaurant that I realized I had been missing out on an incredibly versatile and flavourful vegetable. Although this recipe sidesteps the deep fryer, cooking the Brussels sprouts in a cast iron skillet really brings out their texture and nuttiness. Lemon and pecorino cheese make this dish bright, and adding pistachios makes it so craveable and moreish that it never lasts long.
Pan Fried Brussels Sprouts with Lemon and Pecorino
Serves 4
Ingredients
Toasted Pistachios
- 2 cups (500 mL) shelled raw pistachios
Brussels Sprouts
- ¼ cup (60 mL) neutral oil, such as grapeseed or canola
- 1½ pounds (675 g) Brussels sprouts, thinly sliced
- ½ teaspoon (2 mL) salt
- 1 teaspoon (5 mL) Dijon mustard Pinch of dried red chilies
- Juice of ½ lemon
- 1 tablespoon (15 mL) pistachio oil or extra-virgin olive oil
- ¼ cup (60 mL) toasted pistachios, chopped
- 1 cup (250 mL) finely grated pecorino cheese
Directions
Toasted Pistachios
I don’t think a nut exists that doesn’t benefit from a quick ride in the oven. Toasting nuts intensifies their flavour and dries them out just a touch so that they grow a little more delicious and a little crunchier as well. It’s a small thing that makes a big difference, and so I do recommend, if you have the time and the oven space—and most importantly the inclination—that you toast your nuts. What follows is less a recipe and more of a loose method, since the nut you choose will determine your exact toasting time. If you want to toast a few different nuts together, make sure they are all the same general size or else their toasting times will be different.
Preheat the oven to 325°F (160°C). Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
Spread the nuts in an even layer on the prepared baking sheet. Bake for 8 minutes (or 6 minutes if they are very small nuts like pine nuts). Remove the baking sheet from the oven, give the nuts a stir, and check to see if they are golden and smell nuttier than they did before they went in the oven. You’re going to have to use your judgment here, but I find 8 minutes to be a good amount of time for a light toast on a medium-size nut. For a darker toast, or a larger nut, return to the oven for 2 to 4 minutes and then check again. Repeat as necessary, until your nuts are perfectly golden brown. Let cool.
Store the toasted nuts in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 2 weeks.
Brussels Sprouts
In a medium cast iron skillet, heat about half of the neutral oil over high heat, until it starts to shimmer. Add about half of the Brussels sprouts and sprinkle with about half of the salt. Let the sprouts caramelize over high heat without stirring for 1 to 2 minutes, reducing the heat if they start to look too dark. Stir once. Continue to cook for an additional 1 to 2 minutes until the sprouts are charred but still crunchy. Transfer the sprouts to a large bowl or platter. Repeat with the remaining oil, Brussels sprouts, and salt.
In a small bowl, whisk together the Dijon, chilies, lemon juice, and pistachio oil. Drizzle the mixture over the sprouts. Add the pistachios and about half of the pecorino. Toss well to combine. Top with the remaining pecorino. Serve immediately.
Store leftovers in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 4 days.
Excerpted from A Generous Meal by Christine Flynn. Copyright © 2023 Christine Flynn. Photographs by Suech and Beck. Published by Penguin, an imprint of Penguin Canada, a division of Penguin Random House Canada Limited. Reproduced by arrangement with the Publisher. All rights reserved.
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