Development of palm oil based aqueous cream containing unrefined palm oil

Moisturiser is a common product used in the treatment of skin diseases such as eczema, psoriasis and skin allergy. In Malaysia, 2 in 10 people and 10%-14% of children of below 14 years old have eczema, Jakarta-2%, Bandung-1.6% and Singapore-10.4% (EMS 2010). Moisturiser helps maintain healthy skin by forming occlusive coat on the stratum comeum to retard transepidermal water loss. Formulation of aqueous cream containing unrefined palm oil and palm oil constituents can enhance the effectiveness of the skin treatment as palm oil contains high concentration of vitamin E. Vitamin E consists of high amount of tocopherol and tocotrienol which act as antioxidant. In the study, the formulated aqueous creams are assessed by using LumiFuge (Stability analysis), Mastersizer (Particle size analysis), T A.XT plus Texture Analyzer (Texture analysis), pH meter (pH analysis) and IBM SPSS Statistics. The results have shown that the different composition of palm oil constituents can influence the stability and performance of the aqueous cream.