Searching for healthier beauty products can be overwhelming. The back panels of most products can resemble the classwork of a graduate chemistry class. Some tools can help make the search easier.

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1. View this document for some common personal care ingredients that could be harmful through constant exposure resulting in toxic overload.

2. The Environmental Working Database released their mobile app a few months ago called "EWG's Healthy Living." If you aren’t familiar with their website, Skin Deep is a vast database of beauty products. You can browse or search for specific brands and types of products to find an ingredient-by-ingredient rating of each product on a scale from 1-10, with additional color coding for clarity — green is generally safe, yellow is moderate, red means stay clear! It is a very thorough rating system and an excellent resource off of which to base your product purchasing decisions. The app offers the same resources as the web version, with the additional benefit of making it possible for shoppers to scan bar codes of most products in-store for convenient and precise data. Next time you can’t decide between two new moisturizers, you can give them a quick scan to see how they really fair health-wise, making product decisions a little bit easier.

3. Additional links to explore:

"Dirty Dozen Cosmetic Chemicals" David Suzuki

20 Toxic Ingredients to Avoid

Harmful Chemicals in Personal Care Products