Acne scars not only affect your overall physical appearance but they can also lead to a lowering of one's self esteem. Acne can appear in almost any part of the skin but will mostly affect the face; acne can also occur on the back, shoulders, neck and chest. Dealing with the acne itself can be difficult. However, many people realize that getting rid of the acne is just one part of the treatment-dealing with the acne scars is important too if one wants to get their skin as close as possible to how it appeared before the acne attack.
If left unattended, the scars from an acne break out can last a life time depending on the severity of the acne and how the condition was treated. For instance, persons that scratch, prick and squeeze the acne spots will usually have more conspicuous scars than those who don't. That said, there are various forms of treatment that are meant to aid in the removal of acne scars in order to bring back the almost flawless skin.
Dermabrasion
Dermabrasion is a process that entails removal of the layers of irregular skin that formed on the acne scars in order to bring about smoother skin. During dermabrasion, the dermatologist first rubs and then brushes off part of your skin using appropriate medical tools. The skin takes about two weeks to fully recover from the effects of the operation.
After the operation, a scab forms over the area of the skin that was treated and later peels off when the skin is fully healed thus exposing a new layer of skin. This process works best with persons whose skin color is one either extreme-that is, very dark skinned or very light skinned persons. Those with skin color that largely falls closer towards the centre of either extreme may end up with unevenly colored patches on their skin.
Laser Resurfacing
Laser resurfacing is a fairly new treatment process for acne scars as well as pimples. The procedure entails the use of laser technology to remove the scarred skin cells. Laser resurfacing is a much more precise procedure than dermabrasion. There is choice of laser as the doctor may either use CO2 or YAG laser for treatment-however the effect of either type of laser is more or less the same.
Laser treatment is more intense and thus skin recovery takes longer than dermabrasion often running into several weeks after the procedure. Depending on the size of scars, one may either require a bandage or apply topical ointment in order to help speed up the recovery. Once recovery is complete a new skin will have grown to replace the removed skin cells.
Chemical Peel
Checmical peel is best suited for persons with less severe acne scars. In this form of scar treatment, the doctor applies an acid on the skin in order to bleach the scars. It is a relatively fast procedure and the acid will usually be washed off after 10 to 15 minutes. The acid corrodes and leads to the peeling off of the scarred layers of the skin thus allowing new skin to grow and cover the targeted area. Note that acid treatment may cause temporary swelling or skin paling but this should not take long to clear.
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