Acne can be scary, but do not fear! You can prevent acne from taking over your life! Like everything else, you first need to know what kind of acne you have, before you go in for a treatment. Once you know the kind of acne you have, you can probably identify the cause and then take your treatment forward. This article talks about the broad types of acne.

Acne is broadly classified into two types, Inflammatory and Non Inflammatory , with further sub types of pustules, cysts, white heads or black heads etc.. these are discussed as follows

Non Inflammatory Acne

Microcomedones become non-inflamed skin blemishes called comedones–either a whitehead or a blackhead. Whitehead are formed when trapped sebum and bacteria stay below the skin. They show up as tiny white spots or they may be so small that they are invisible to the naked eye. Blackheads are formed when the pores open to the surface and the sebum , which contains melanin, oxidises and turns black/ brown. Blackheads can last for a long time because the contents are slow to drain to the surface.

Inflammatory Acne

A blackhead or whitehead can release its contents to the surface and heal. Or, the follicle wall can rupture and inflammatory acne can ensue . This rupture can be caused by random occurrence or by picking or touching the skin.

A Papule is formed when there is a freak in the follicular wall and the White Blood Cells rush in and the pore becomes inflamed. A Pustule forms several days later when white blood cells make their way to the surface of the skin. Commonly referred to as a “zit” or a “pimple”.

An inflamed lesion can sometimes completely collapse or explode, severely inflaming the surrounding skin, and sometimes engulfing neighbouring follicles. Nodules are large inflamed bumps that occur when a follicle breaks along the bottom. These can be sore to touch. Cysts are large pus filled lesions.

Now that you know what kind of acne you have, you can go on and read up on the possible cause of what might have caused it. Once you know why and what, then you can look up on the various treatments available. Congratulations! You have taken steps towards a acne free skin.

This entry was posted on Monday, September 8th, 2008 at 12:23 am and is filed under zitmeds. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.