Acne Treatment Review and Acne Elimination

Light therapy treatment augments traditional treatment for acne. For mild comodomal/pustular acne, traditional topical treatment can be used.. For more progressive inflammatory acne, dermatologists could decide to combine topical acne treatment and light therapy. Cystic acne too is often treated with oral and topical medications along with light therapy.

Light therapy typically comes in two types:

* 410nm blue light

* 1064nm red light

Blue light initiates a chemical reaction that causes the proliferation of endogenic porphrins (chemicals that you have within the skin), which attack and kill /p. acnes/, the bacteria that is responsible for acne. Since the this reaction is not antibiotic-mediated, a person never develops a resistance to blue light therapy.

Red light, however, works on the sebaceous glands rather than the bacteria that cause acne. The sebaceous glands produce sebum, which flows out of the follicle to protect the skin. Bacteria tend to live within the follicular-sebum milieu. 1064nm light can penetrate deeply into the skin and destroy the sebaceous glands, thus decreasing sebum production. The end result is less p. acnes and an improvement of acne.

The IPL laser, often used to treat acne, typically has wavelengths of 510-1200nm, thus theoretically covering both the effects of blue and red light. Unfortunately, the absorption spectrum of the porphyrins within the skin is pretty specific. Blue light concentrates all its energy at 410nm, the ideal wavelength, whereas IPL only has a small amount of energy within this range. The same applies in the red light spectra. A 1064nm laser emits concentrated energy in this spectra and has a better effect on destroying sebaceous glands than IPL, which again devotes less energy to this wavelength region.
If lasers are used to treat acne, the use of blue light and 1064nm lasers should be combined to both kill /p. acnes/ and reduce sebum production. The result will be better then when IPL or either device alone is used.