Learn About Isotretinoin (Accutane)
Isotretinoin is a prescription retinoid. It is the oral version, meaning many of the other retinoids are topical! Most of you are going to take 0.25 to 0.5 mg for every kilo of your body weight. This is going to come in 2 two each day for the most part. Of course, you can get more than this. The max, though, is 2 mg for every kilo! This treatment, ladies, will usually last for up to 20 weeks. There's good news for some of you. If your acne goes down by 70 percent or more, your doctor can stop your treatment before 20 weeks have passed! That said, you're going to have strict instructions, like joining an isotretinoin registry! Your doctor is going to keep a close eye on you as well.
Ladies, this is an effective prescription acne treatment. It's going to help when other treatments for acne haven't been incredibly helpful. These other treatments mean OTC acne washes and topical acne spot treatments. Topical retinoids for acne are often prescribed first too. This medication, though, is also amazing as an acne scar treatment! Ladies, get familiar with isotretinoin before you get a prescription!
How It Works
Isotretinoin is a prescription medication. Ladies, it falls into the retinoid class, and it's a synthetic vitamin A. It's a common oral one, often sold as Accutane! This medication helps make your sebaceous glands smaller. That reduces how much sebum they make! It'll help reduce bacteria on your skin and skin inflammation. Ultimately, it works by drying your skin!
This medication will make your skin cells turn over a lot faster. This means keeping more pores unclogged! Isotretinoin does more than this too. Ladies, it lets your skin produce more neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin, which helps your sebaceous glands get smaller! This prescription even works on blocking MMP-9 action in your sebum, helping its effectiveness quite a lot.
Common Uses
Ladies, this is a very strong medication for acne! It's most often prescribed for severe nodular acne. However, you have other common ways to use it! Doctors recommend it when you have acne scarring. This medication is great when acne causes you psychological stress! Of course, doctors usually only prescribe it when other treatments haven't worked. These other acne treatments often refer to antibiotics, OTC topical products, and other acne medications. Ladies, severe nodular acne gets the higher doses of this medication. The other ones get a lower dose!
Isotretinoin works for more than just acne, though. Doctors say it helps you when you have cutaneous T-cell lymphoma. It even helps when you're at a high risk of skin cancer, ladies, especially when you're in your child-bearing years! Many dermatologists claim it's the preferred option here, since it has a shorter half-life than many medications.
Side Effects
This isn't the first acne treatment used, thanks to the side effects. Isotretinoin comes with lots of them, like headaches, back pain, vision problems, and nosebleeds. Of course, ladies, you'll see lots of dryness in your skin. This includes your lips! You'll deal with dry eyes and a dry nose too. Some of you will experience cold symptoms and skin reactions too. Remember, ladies, to call your doctor for severe side effects! These severe ones are hearing issues, increased thirst, peeing more often, and hallucinations. This medication also carries depression symptoms as a side effect. You have to let your doctor know about those right away too!
Ladies, some of you will deal with liver and pancreas issues. Thus, you have to watch for things like dark pee, jaundice, and appetite loss. Report them to your doctor immediately! Do this for stomach pain when it spreads to your back too. Other serious side effects involve your stomach, so call for swallowing pain, diarrhea, rectal bleeding, and severe chest pain!
Precautions
Ladies, isotretinoin comes with many precautions. It's not suitable for all of you! Some of the things that often make it unsafe are a history of high cholesterol, liver disease, heart disease, and asthma. Others are diabetes, IBD, and osteoporosis! This medication gets unsafe when you have some mental health conditions, especially depression. Ladies, you'll want to go over your medical history with your doctor when they're considering this medication for you. It helps avoid all of these issues! Of course, you have to know kids under 12 can't take it either.
The biggest precaution, though, is about pregnancy and breastfeeding. Ladies, when either applies to you, you have to avoid isotretinoin! Just 1 dose can trigger many complications, like birth defects, miscarriage, and premature birth. You'll need regular pregnancy tests to help with this. Most doctors need you to take them before, during, and after your treatment! Using 2 forms of birth control is very common and often required too. Doctors will order regular blood tests in many cases. Other things will help with this medication also. This means taking it with at least 1 glass of water. You'll only get a 30-day supply of this to avoid side effects too. The prescription also has to be filled within a week.
Medication Interactions
Ladies, list your current medications, including anything available OTC and your supplements! This list will help your doctor avoid the medication interactions with isotretinoin. There are lots of them, so you need to go over this list carefully! Oral steroids are a big category for these interactions. This includes dexamethasone! Many anticonvulsants, such as phenytoin, trigger interactions too. There's more to consider, though. Remember ladies, isotretinoin is a synthetic version of vitamin A. This is why many doctors will ask you to avoid taking any vitamin A supplements until a little while after your treatment has ended. They'll direct you on this!