Rosacea


Rosacea is a com­mon skin con­di­tion that presents as red­ness, with or with­out pim­ples, to the cheeks, nose, and chin. It is often called adult acne” because it usu­al­ly starts many years after ado­les­cence. Although there are many dif­fer­ent thoughts on the cause of this con­di­tion, there are many dif­fer­ent treat­ment options that can be very effec­tive. Each treat­ment option is tar­get­ed to treat each of the dif­fer­ent forms of rosacea – back­ground red­ness and acne bumps.

One hall­mark” symp­tom of rosacea is the flush­ing or blush­ing of the cheeks when exposed to cer­tain trig­gers. These trig­gers can be any­thing from food or drinks, to envi­ron­men­tal fac­tors like cold or hot weath­er. This flush­ing is actu­al­ly the blood ves­sels in the super­fi­cial lay­ers of the skin becom­ing larg­er and giv­ing the skin a more red­dish hue. After many years of this fre­quent flush­ing, the blood ves­sels will actu­al­ly stay dilat­ed and the skin will stay per­ma­nent­ly red. There are top­i­cal gels and creams that can be used to help min­i­mize flush­ing and pre­vent the red­ness from wors­en­ing, how­ev­er it will not get rid of the red­ness that is already present. This will require a cos­met­ic laser treat­ment. Over 2 – 3 treat­ments, this laser treat­ment can be very effec­tive. The laser is a quick, in-office pro­ce­dure and requires no down­time. This treat­ment can be per­formed by any of the physi­cians in our office.

Anoth­er com­mon symp­tom of rosacea is the acne bumps that can accom­pa­ny the back­ground red­ness. These bumps usu­al­ly come and go, but can often be deep, painful lesions that stick around for a few weeks at a time. These can be treat­ed with a com­bi­na­tion of top­i­cal gels or creams, and if nec­es­sary oral antibi­otics, and are gen­er­al­ly very effective.

There is no rea­son to suf­fer with rosacea any longer! There are very many effec­tive treat­ments that can be used to con­trol flares and get rid of acne bumps. See a der­ma­tol­o­gist to dis­cuss the most appro­pri­ate treat­ment option for you.