The role of lasers for acne treatment is twofold. First, lasers kill acne bacteria. Without bacteria, acne lesions cannot form. P.acne bacteria is naturally occuring in the skin and by using heat energy from lasers, acne bacteria is controlled. It is important to realize that controlling acne bacteria is only a temporary solution for controlling acne, and acne bacteria can and may return in a short time. Because acne bacteria are natually occurring in the skin, any solution for controlling acne by killing acne bacteria (like antibiotics, blu-u light treatments or topical creams) will need to be repeated often to control the acne. A longer term benefit of laser acne treatment is the control of the amount of oil produced by the sebaceous (oil) gland. By controlling and limiting the amount of excess oil produced by the sebaceous gland, it is less likely that future acne will form. Excess oil contributes to blocked pores and this in turn leads to acne lesions. Using lasers, it is possible to shrink the sebaceous gland so that it does not produce as much oil in the future and therefore leads to less acne. Although the amount of oil production after laser treatment varies from patient to patient, we find that using lasers allows us to achieve a significant reduction in the amount of active acne for between 70% and 80% of patients we see.
