Laser treatments can be designed to target acne, eliminate the appearance of acne scarring and hinder the possibility of future breakouts.
The laser produces a powerful pulsed light at a wavelength that is absorbed by naturally occurring chemicals in the skin known as porphyrins. When exposed to a specific wavelength of light, these porphyrins change and hinder metabolism, thereby destroying the bacteria. Future breakouts of acne are inhibited in this way. Over a series of sessions the amount of acne is gradually reduced.
After laser skin resurfacing, patients will need to wait about 18 months to see the final results. During this healing period, the skin and its collagen rebuild and scars are smoothed out. For acne scar removal laser re-surfacing is often combined with one or more other treatments. This combination approach gives consistently better results when compared with other techniques.
Any surgical treatment is usually completed 6-12 weeks prior to laser resurfacing. This allows the skin adequate time to heal. Laser resurfacing is well suited to treating shallow boxcar type scars, as well as for tightening and smoothing scars that had been previously treated.
The most modern forms of non-ablative skin resurfacing techniques offer scar removal options little or no downtime so patients can get right back to their normal routine immediately following the session. The method is virtually pain free and was designed to leave skin looking smooth, even-toned and blemish-free. Patients often report few side effects from this acne scar removal method, if any are experienced at all.
In a 2003 study published in The Lancet, British doctors recruited 41 adults affected by mild to moderate acne, and gave 31 of them a single session of pulse-dye laser treatment. The other 10 participants were given a placebo treatment. After three months, the laser treated group had acne symptoms that were only half as severe as before. As expected, the placebo treatment produced no positive effect.
Pulse-dye laser treatments had already been used for birthmarks and fine lines by targeting small blood vessels in the skin. The light is converted into heat which destroys the blood vessels while leaving the surrounding skin undamaged. There was some anecdotal evidence that these lasers could treat acne, but the researchers said it was the first study of its kind.
“Our results suggest that this laser treatment could be developed as a new therapeutic approach that would allow simultaneous treatment of both active acne and associated scarring,” said Dr. Tony Chu of London’s Hammersmith Hospital. Chu said lasers could one day replace acne creams and oral antibiotics used to treat acne skin problems.
In an editorial accompanying the study in The Lancet, American dermatologist Dr. Guy Webster said that the result is encouraging, but more research needs to be done.
“More work is certainly needed, both to confirm the clinical benefit… and to elucidate its mechanism,” said Webster.
Other dermatologists say the laser treatment is still unproven and may not be best for simple blackheads and whiteheads, or for very deep acne scar removal.
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