Embarrassing body bummers

By Stacey Colino

For as long as there have been embarrassing health problems -- unwanted facial hair, bad breath, excessive sweating, cold sores, urinary incontinence -- there have been remedies that promise to alleviate them. Unfortunately, the purported cures haven't always worked well and in some cases have made the problems worse.

Now there are new and truly effective ways to battle these classic body bummers. What works, and what doesn't:

Facial hair
If you've experienced noticeable facial hair, you've probably already tried tweezing, waxing, bleaching, shaving or electrolysis.

But there are newer (and sometimes better) options available. A prescription cream called Vaniqa slows the hair-regrowth cycle, so you don't have to remove hair as often. It's relatively free of side effects, outside of slight stinging. If you want benefits to last, you need to use the cream indefinitely. (It costs about $25 for a one-month supply.)

Lasers are a good option for dark hair, and a recent technological breakthrough -- in which the laser's pulse duration is increased to cause the equivalent of a slower "cook" of the follicle -- now makes it possible to treat darker skin without damage. Results aren't necessarily permanent, however. But if you have it done once a month for three to five months, you'll be hair-free for up to eight months, says Deborah Sarnoff, M.D., a cosmetic dermatologist in New York City and author of Beauty and the Beam: Your Complete Guide to Cosmetic Laser Surgery (St. Martin's, 1998). And the hair that comes back tends to be finer and lighter in color.