Concerns We Treat
Acne Scars & Scarring
The marks left behind after acne has passed, pitted or raised, long after the breakouts themselves are gone.
The marks left behind after acne has passed, pitted or raised, long after the breakouts themselves are gone.
Acne scars are the record the skin keeps of the breakouts it could not heal cleanly. When inflammation reaches deep into the dermis, the body's repair response does its best, but the new tissue laid down rarely matches the smooth surface that came before. Some scars sink into the skin as small craters, ice picks, boxcars, rolling depressions. Others rise above the surface, raised and firm. Most are neither dramatic nor erased on their own.
Scars are not the same thing as the marks left immediately after a breakout. The pink or brown discoloration that lingers after a pimple has cleared, what is often called post-inflammatory hyperpigmentation, fades on its own over months. True scarring is textural. It will not lift with brightening alone.
Treatment for acne scars suits anyone who has come through their active breakout years, or whose breakouts are well controlled, and who would rather meet the marks that remain than continue past them. The skin must have time to repair between treatments, and that is more easily done when new inflammation is rare.
It also suits those willing to commit to the pace. Acne scar treatment is most rewarding when planned across a series of visits with months between them. We design that arc in consultation, and we are honest at every stage about what improvement to expect, and what to accept as the limit of what these tools can reach.
Scars form when the inflammation of acne reaches deep enough into the skin to damage the collagen and elastin that hold its structure. The body responds the way it would to any wound, by laying down repair tissue, but the architecture of the original skin is not perfectly restored. The deeper or longer-lived the inflammation, the more visible the scar that follows.
Genetics decide how readily a particular person's skin scars. Some people pass through years of breakouts with little long-term marking. Others scar from a single inflamed lesion. Picking, popping, and squeezing reliably worsen scarring in everyone, and this is one of the few places where the daily habit and the long outcome are closely tied.
You may notice:
Acne scars do not deepen on their own, but they can read more visibly with the years as the skin around them grows thinner and shadows fall more sharply across the surface. What was a quiet shallow depression at twenty-five may catch light more obviously at forty. Time does not create new scarring without new breakouts, but it does change the canvas against which existing scars are seen.
This is part of why treatment, when chosen, is best done while the skin's repair capacity is still robust. Younger skin rebuilds collagen more readily than older skin, and the same intervention yields a stronger result earlier than it does later. The work is not urgent. But sooner returns more than later.
I’ve been seeing Sarah Safa for over 10 years. Sarah and her team provide the best quality and service in the industry. I highly recommend Refined Aesthetics!
Sarah is so naturally kind and knows her profession very good. She keeps you so calm by asking how you are doing and having good conversation with you while doing procedures. I absolutely love her sweet personality. I had laser done on my legs from years of sun damage and it went so smooth. Thanks Sarah! The whole team is so professional and nice.
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