Disclaimer: I am not a doctor, nurse, nutritionist, herbalist, or otherwise medically trained person.
I am an ordinary person who has suffered from adult acne since 1995 and have found no solution to my acne through conventional medicine.
May 5, 2003
posted by Colleen Shirazi at
6:17 PM (Pacific)
Okee...
Definitely, taking a multi-vitamin has helped my acne. My skin looks good now. It's not perfectly clear, but it's as clear as it has been for years. I can live with this skin. There are a few clogged pores but no pimples.
But, I am not completely happy with the TwinLab Daily One Caps. I think the amounts of some of the nutrients are too much. I don't know what taking excessive nutrients is going to do to me in the long run.
I read on the Net (one of the vitamin-selling sites) that taking too much vitamin A can cause birth defects. (I suppose this is the same logic that says Accutane definitely causes birth defects because Accutane is a concentrated form of vitamin A, right?) Now I've already had my kids, but that's something to consider if you haven't.
The amount of vitamin A that site recommended was 4,000 IU and the Daily One Caps has 10,000 IU.
I checked out a few prenatal vitamins and sure enough, the amount of vitamin A was in the 4,000 - 5,000 IU range.
*sigh* We live in a society where I feel we are forced by conventional medicine into taking pharmaceuticals for everything, ie, there is next to no research for anything falling outside of taking pharmaceuticals for everything. I'm just a regular non-medical person yet, by fiddling around taking vitamins, I've made more of a dent in my acne than any dermatologist or doctor I've seen.
I still don't know exactly which nutrients help with acne or what amounts of them one should take.
I'm going to stick with the Daily One Caps until they're finished, and also look into prenatal vitamins. My logic is that even if supplements are not regulated by the government (as they should be), manufacturers of prenatal vitamins will be extra-careful not to put anything dangerous in them?
On the other hand, what really were my alternatives? More topical acne medications (more $$$ down the drain)? Oral antibiotics? I've heard (reliably) that they can make you pregnant if you're on the Pill or other hormone-based birth control. Accutane? Does anyone know what having taken Accutane might do to you when you get old? Can anyone tell you?
Wouldn't it be easier just to figure out what's causing all this acne? Historically, adult acne is new, but it's been around for years. I've had mine for 7-1/2 years. Has anyone bothered to gather statistics--who has adult acne? How many are women? Of those, which birth control methods have they used (any connection between hormone-based b.c. and acne)? What do they eat? Any specific vitamin deficiencies? Or is it a matter of metabolizing vitamins?
I caught a blip on some local news station saying that people "metabolize" high fructose corn syrup differently than plain old cane sugar. What do they mean by that? They said high fructose corn syrup is subsidized by the government (U.S.) so it's used much more now than before.
Any connection between hormones in meat and acne? Any adult acne sufferers grow up vegetarian?
I'm thinking of making an acne poll...that would be interesting. If everyone with acne, who visited this page, answered those questions, what would the results be?
