best
acne solutions
How to Choose the
Best
Acne
Solutions for
You
There are a few different things
to consider when choosing the best acne solutions for
you. How severe is your acne? Are you a man or a woman?
Are you open to trying natural acne solutions? Let’s take a
look at each of them.
Best Acne
Solutions: Mild Acne
If you are one of the lucky
ones with mild acne that flares up occasionally but you
sometimes have fairly clear skin and rarely more than a few
blemishes, a topical acne treatment is the best acne solution
for you. You should try a 2.5% benzoyl peroxide gel that you
can buy over the counter at any drugstore. It’s cheap and
effective. You never need stronger than 2.5% as clinical
studies have proven that stronger is not better when it comes
to benzoyl peroxide.
READ MY REVIEWS OF THE TOP-RATED ACNE TREATMENTS
HERE!
Mild Acne TIP: Apply the
benzoyl peroxide gel twice per day in a thin layer after wiping
your skin with a salicylic acid pad. The salicylic acid will
help the benzoyl peroxide to penetrate into your clogged pores.
Read my article on Acne
Prone Skin Care to make sure you are cleaning your face
properly for maximum benefit.
Best Acne Solutions:
Moderate and Severe Acne
You have moderate to severe
acne if you never have clear skin or your pimples are deeper in
your skin and tend to last for longer than a week at a time.
You may also experience painful pimples. If this sounds like
you, then topical treatments such as benzoyl peroxide are
unlikely to help. Acne is caused by androgen (male) hormones.
These hormones cause problems by increasing the production of
oils called sebum in your skin and also by increasing the
production of keratin. The process is not entirely understood,
but keratin is a sticky substance that causes dead skin cells
in your hair follicles to stick together and clog the pores.
Once the pores are clogged, the sebum can’t escape and you have
a blackhead or whitehead. If these get infected, you have a
pimple.
Moderate and severe acne
sufferers have to take steps to reduce sebum and keratin
production by controlling their androgen hormones or taking
Accutane.
Best Acne
Solutions: Accutane
Accutane was once hailed as
the miracle acne drug. It is very effective at reducing sebum
production, although how it works is not well understood. Most
people who take Accutane are cured of their acne after one or
several “courses of treatment” which can last about six weeks
during which they must be monitored by their doctor. I say that
it was “once hailed” because Accutane is no longer available in
the American market due to severe side effects. These side
effects include:
• Severe stomach
Pain
• Back Ache
• Bleeding gums
• Blurred vision and poor night
vision
• Bone pain
• Joint pain
• Depression
• Suicidal thoughts
• Extreme dry crusty skin, lips
and eyes
• Sensitive skin
• Nose bleeds
• Rectal bleeding
• Severe diarrhoea
• Behavioural changes
• Liver and kidney
damage
• Birth defects
• dry eyes and difficulty wearing
contact lenses even after treatment has stopped
• Thinning hair
In addition to these side
effects, Accutane is not a fast-acting solution for acne. Your
acne will get much worse before it gets better and you can
expect to wait for up to a year for your acne to completely
clear. Accutane should, therefore, only be considered as a last
resort acne solution. Only consider Accutane if the other
methods available don’t work for you.
Accutane
Tip: Accutane therapy is not cheap. You will
spend several thousand dollars on Accutane treatment when you
factor in the cost of the pills as well as doctor visits and
medical tests. This is another reason to give other acne
solutions a try before Accutane.
Best Acne
Solutions: For Women with Moderate to Severe
Acne
Women have a bit of an
advantage over men when it comes to treating androgen hormone
production (the real cause of acne). Men would not try to
reduce androgen hormones because they are “male” hormones and
men simply need male hormones to be men. Women also have
androgen hormones produced by their ovaries in much smaller
amounts than men do. If you are a woman, you might notice that
your breakouts are most severe at a certain time of your cycle
when your ovaries increase hormone production. The answer might
be hormone therapy. This might simply mean going on an estrogen
rich birth control pill or medications such as Spironolactone.
If you are interested in these acne solutions, read my article
on Hormonal Acne Treatments for
Women.
Best Acne
Solutions: Controlling Hormones
Naturally
While Accutane should only be
used as a last resort and hormone treatments are not for
everyone, moderate to severe acne sufferers can benefit from
lifestyle changes aimed at reducing acne. It is now known that
diet plays a key role in acne and it is theorized that diet can
affect your androgen hormone levels. Many people see positive
results by modifying their diets and lifestyle in accordance
with the holistic acne solutions which I have reviewed on this
site. The main advantage of these programs over Accutane and
hormone therapy is cost, no negative side effects, and speed of
treatment. In fact, many people report that they see noticeable
improvement in their skin in only a few days to a few weeks
versus 6 months to a year with Accutane. It is recommended that
you try these programs before Accutane, to see if you can be
cured without undergoing harsh
treatment.
Best Acne
Solutions: Antibiotics? No Way
Antibiotics, both topical and
oral have been prescribed by generations of dermatologists as a
solution to acne. The truth is that bacteria only play a
supporting role in acne so it is impossible to cure acne with
antibiotics. Besides being expensive and ineffective, there are
many good reasons not to use antibiotics in the treatment of
acne. First, it is hard on your body. Your stomach may not
respond well to drugs that must be taken without food.
Antibiotics are like nuclear weapons: non-discriminatory. Human
beings depend on “good bacteria” for proper health and these
antibiotics kill the good with the bad, leading to a host of
additional problems that might be worse than the acne we are
trying to clear. Finally, the use of antibiotics leads to the
creation of antibiotic resistant bacteria. While these bacteria
might not be harmful to you, it might create problems for
people who don’t tolerate bacteria as well. If they become
infected, there may be no drugs available to fight these
resistant bacteria. This is such a big problem that most
doctors have scaled way back on prescribing antibiotics for
anything except serious infections. So do yourself and everyone
else, a favour and just say no to antibiotics!