Medical Procedures That Can Eliminate Acne Scars

Is there anything worse than suffering from acne? For those who have beat acne they will tell you YES, Acne scars! Acne scars can last for severals years after getting rid of acne and can be just as damaging to self-esteem. So, how can we get rid of acne scars? Let us take a look at four medical procedures commonly used to permanently remove acne scars from its victims.

However, first lets look at clearing up acne. You must eliminate acne before getting rid of scars, your dermatologist can help.

Prevent Acne

A qualified dermatologist will work with you to stop acne from getting worse. They will analyze your skin type and help figure out your acne triggers in order to help prevent new acne from developing. Once triggers are found and a plan of prevention is in order, they can focus on getting rid of present acne and creating a plan of action to eliminate and prevent scarring.

What is an acne scar?

If a pimples gets inflamed and does not heal correctly, an acne scar develops. Acne scars may be only one skin layer deep (easier to eliminate) or they may be many layers deep depending on the level of damaged skin. This is why you should never "pop" a pimple. The damage from squeezing a pimple can be quite deep and severe under the skin.

See, when the facial skin is damaged the body must form new tissue fibers over the wound to heal. This is to prevent bacteria and other objects from entering the body through the wound and interrupting the healing process. This new tissue is usually thicker than normal skin tissue to better protect the wound under it, making it a scar. If you want to premantly eliminate acne scars, you have to remove the thicker scar tissue completely and replace it with healthy skin. The deeper and thicker a scar, the more time and effort it will take to remove. The process used to remove scars will depend on treatment preference, how much scarring exists, and the level of severity.

What Treatment is Right?

When visiting a dermatologist to discuss medical treatment options for acne scars, be sure to ask these questions:

1. How effective is each treatment option?

Not all treatments have highly effective results. Make sure the treatments you are considering have a good success rate.

2. Are there side effects? If so, what are they?

As with any medical procedure, there may be certain side effects and risk associated with treatment. Be sure to find out what those risks or side effects are so you can make an educated decision.

3. What is the percent of patients who are happy with the results of each treatment option?

While some treatments may be highly effective at removing acne scars, the end result may leave patients less than thrilled at now having hyperpigmentation of the skin. Ask to speak with patients willing to share their experience and results. A doctor should have a list of phone numbers readily available for these patients.

4. How many treatments will it take?

Certain treatments, like Dermabrasion, may take two or three rounds before all scars are removed because it removes scarring by skin layer. Those with deep scarring may want to look for other methods of removal rather than face multiple treatments, long healing times, and high costs.

5. What is the healing time, the "down time"?

Some treatments to remove acne scars take as long as six months to fully heal! Make sure you can afford to be "down" that long.

6. What is the cost per treatment?

It is important to remember that acne scar removal is cosmetic. That means your insurance plan will most likely not pay a cent towards the cost of the procedure or your healing time away from work. It will be your responsibly to foot all the costs associated with removing your acne scars. Make sure you can afford it! Some acne treatments, such as laser resurfacing, can cost a minimum of $4,000 for one treatment.

Here is a look at four common medical procedures used to treat and remove acne scars.

Acne scars - Four common medical treatment methods

Laser resurfacing:

A very precise method of scar removal. Pulsed or steady light is moved quickly in a precise pattern over the skin to remove thin layers of the scar. Since the laser moves quickly over the skin heat damage is minimal. Your doctor will determine the type of laser and light used based on medical history and level of scarring. The healing time for this treatment option is about two weeks.The cost is around a minimum of $4,000 but usually closer to $6,000 - $8,000 per treatment.

Dermabrasion:

Uses a tool with a wire or rough edged brush that spins rapidly to smooth, shape, and remove layers of skin. As we talked about earlier, when the skin is wounded it will grow new skin to protect and heal the wounded areas. Dermabrasion purposely wounds the skin and makes it bleed in order to get new skin growth to occur.

This is a fairly quick treatment, done in the doctors office and you are numbed with a local anesthetic and ice before the procedure or if scars are deep enough, you will be put to sleep. This treatment usually takes about 3 months to fully recover from but new skin will start growing in as little as 1-2 weeks, and normal activities can be resumed in 2 weeks. This treatment costs around $1500 and usually requires multiple treatments.

Chemical peels:

Chemical solutions are applied to the skin, the skin "burns" and blisters form. Much like a bad sun burn the blisters will start to peel. The skin under the peel is new and smooth. Chemical peels can work for both light scarring and deep thick scars because the chemical solution can be mild or deep penetrating.

Your dermatologist will determine the type of chemical peel needed, number of peels it will take to get desired results, and when they be repeated. Healing time depends on the type of peel you had done. A light peel may take up to two weeks to heal and cost about $100 per peel while a deep penetrating full face peel may can cost about $4,000 and may take a few months to heal. During healing you will need to avoid the sun as the new skin will be extremely sensitive to the sun light.

Punch Excision grafting:

Used for deep acne scars, this procedure uses a punch biopsy tool with varying sizes of 1.5mm to 3.5 mm. This tool is sometimes remarked as a cookie cutter because it works almost the same way. A local anesthesia is given and the punch tool is used to "punch out" the scarred areas. Then a skin graft will be taken from behind the ear and uses to cover the opening left by the punch biopsy tool. This method usually means no scarring from the procedure. Cost and healing times vary between a few weeks and a couple hundred dollars and up. Your dermatologist will estimate this cost for you based on how many scars need removed.

Punch Excision is the same method of scar removal as above, without the skin graft. Instead, the wound is sutured. This method does produce a scar from the suture but will usually fade over time. Cost and healing times similar to Punch Excision Grafting procedure.