The best thing to do before trying to get rid of acne is to understand its causes.

It is important to understand why you have acne breakouts. Acne is a term used to define many kinds of skin conditions, such as blackheads, whiteheads, pimples and cysts. In most case it is caused by clogged pored with dead skin cells or due to an excess in the sebum production the skin manufactures to keep itself supple and moisturized.

The ideal situation is when the sebum produced by the skin travels along the hair shaft from the follicle to the skin surface. When this travel is slowed for some reason or the sebum hardens the skin pores often gets blocked forming an infection at the follicle where the clog forms. In curing acne, it is important that this process is understood and the factors that create the optimal condition for acne formation are reduced.

First you must keep your skin clean, and then you need to remove the dead skin and/or the dry skin. This will help prevent excessive sebum formation, so that it does its job of keeping skin moisturized. In many cases the outbreaks are treated with benzoyl peroxide and this is considered one of the best solutions to curing acne. The bacteria causing the pimples on the surface can be killed by the treatment and this clears the skin.

Stronger Methods for Bigger Problems

Cysts can also form under the skin’s surface, the root of the cyst being at the same level as the hair root. This is referred to as cystic acne and the pustule on the surface can be up to 5mm in diameter. Squeezing such cysts only makes the condition worse. Since the acne is deeply embedded in the skin in these cases, the more typical treatments used in curing acne such as topical creams and solutions have little effect in curing cystic acne.

Some antibiotics can be purchased at any drug stores that can be used in these particular cases. These treatments are especially design to treat cystic acne. The best treatments in curing acne of this sort is to keep the surface of the skin clean with a mild cleanser and light rubbing, though not squeezing. As mentioned before, squeezing a cyst will only aggravate the situation that would other otherwise clear up in a couple of weeks. If interfered with, the cysts can take much longer to disappear and accompanied with much pain.

It is always best to take precautionary measures, in the case you have an outbreak, there are always several over the counter solutions to help curing acne. When the infection is more severe, however, it is always best to consult a dermatologist who can recognize the exact nature of acne and suggest methods that would be helpful in curing acne.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 27th, 2008 at 7:55 am and is filed under Acne. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.