Acne scars are a result of the appearance of acne. This skin ailment starts when the skin is irritated by excess sebum, the oil that is usually produced by the sebaceous glands to moisturize and protect the skin. Outside factors to sebum production include hormone imbalance and high stress levels.

When sebum made increases, it is forcefully pushed through the follicle to the skin's surface, damaging the cells lining the pore in the process. Additionally, other factors can make the sebum even more damaging to the skin. These factors include a deficiency in essential fatty acids, which keep the sebum oil from hardening, and acne causing bacteria.

This physical state change means that sebum more easily blocks pores, trapping debris and bacteria inside, allowing them to multiply. The body's immune response includes sending immune cell soldiers to the site to fight off the bacteria and further protect the skin from damage; however, this response can actually further damage the skin. In their over eager efforts to get rid of these foreign bodies, the immune cells destroy healthy tissue that is caught up in the battle. Furthermore, the injury to the dermal layer also affects the amount of collagen found and produced, ultimately leaving a scar.

Body acne scars come both as hypertrophic and atrophic scars. Hypertrophic scars are those that extend from the normal level of skin and include keloid scars, which are hypertrophic scars that continue to expand in size. These types of scars are more commonly found on the chest or back than the face. Facial acne tends to cause atrophic scars, those that appear as dents or valleys in the skin. Ice pick, box car and rolling scars are bound down because the injury is found at the dermal layer, also making these types of scars very difficult to remove.

Facial Acne Scar Treatment Options

To rid facial acne scars, normal scar procedures won't cut it. To illustrate, the injection of steroids to flatten hypertrophic scars will not diminish these scars. Generally, it is very hard to raise depressed skin.

In order to raise skin, one must generate new and healthy skin cells. Facial resurfacing for acne scars describes a method to bring up your skin. Although methods differ in how they remove layers of skin, the general idea is a controlled removal of skin tissue to stimulate skin cell regeneration.

Laser resurfacing for facial acne scars uses non-ablative lasers on the skin, sending quick pulses of high energy light. The light is converted into heat energy that systematically vaporizes one layer after the next of skin. However, you don't simply laser face acne scars away. Scar tissue is eradicated and fresh skin growth is encouraged to replace the tissue that was removed. For a precise, safe method, laser skin resurfacing acne scars causes little outside damage to surrounding skin. For this reason, it is safe to use and so popular on facial scars.

There are other resurfacing options but are not as effective. Utilizing dermabrasion on acne scars uses the same principle but is a less precise method. A dermabrasion treatment uses a high speed rotary instrument to exfoliate away layers of skin. Similarly, chemical peels on facial acne scars removes skin with a chemical solution that makes the skin blister and fall away.

Both techniques are applied to the whole face and are quite lengthy in their healing times.

Facial surgery for acne scars might also be considered for depressed scars. Subcision refers to the method that cuts the deeper layers of the skin so it is no longer tied down. The various punch techniques are used for deep scars, especially ice pick. Punch excision, punch excision with skin grafts and punch elevation all remove the scar from the skin.

Dermal fillers are a temporary solution for facial acne scars, raising lowered areas for a period of time, but requiring repeated injections as time goes on.