This tragic story about the New York teen who died from excessive use of a muscle cream that contained the anti-inflammatory ingredient methyl salicylate may be a rare incident, but it is a reminder to us all about the importance of knowing your ingredients and not using any product to excess.

I'm an obsessive label reader and try to do my best to know the good from the bad ingredients. It's not always easy, especially with so many new skin care products flooding the market these days. We live in an era of information overload, so keeping up with product ingredients is a difficult task.

For those of you who are like me and are a bit obsessive about skin care ingredients, you’ll want to bookmark the Environmental Working Group's (EWG) Skin Deep database Web site.

EWG is a non-profit public interest watchdog group and environmental research organization. The organization covers a wide variety of public safety concerns from toxins in food and water to harmful chemicals in skin care products.

The Skin Deep database allows readers to look up different skin care brands to see the exact ingredients in each product and the safety rating of the ingredients. It will point out which ingredients are linked to cancer; developmental/reproductive toxicity; violations, restrictions and warnings; allergies/immunotoxicity; and other concerns associated with the ingredient. The Skin Deep database covers 25,000 personal care products and is quite extensive and a wealth of knowledge.

However, keep in mind that there are two camps to some of these ingredient studies; and for some ingredients, such as the parabens, there is much disagreement between the two sides on how damaging they actually are to our health when used in small amounts. As with any research study, you have to read the research from all sides and decide for yourself.

It's a balancing act, but one worth pursuing. After all, you are responsible for your own health and no one, not even the FDA or your doctors, is going to look out for your health and longevity they way you can. The best way to take control over your health is to be proactive and educated.