Exploring the Connection Between Acne and Hygiene By J. Martin At Isnare.com Ezine Articles

One of the first things that a person noticing acne on their face or other part of the body is likely to start wondering about is as to what they might have done to make themselves prone to this distressing condition. Opinion on this regard is not likely to be in short supply: as they are bound to find suggestions to the effect that through their dietary and self care practices, they might have done things which made them prone to acne.

With regard to the self-care aspect, a person suffering from acne is likely implicit insinuations to the effect that low standards of hygiene could be one of the factors contributing to their acne problem. But just what impact does hygiene have on acne? In other words, how strong is the acne-hygiene connection?

Well, in order to be in a competent position to understand the acne-hygiene connection, it would be important for us to first acquaint ourselves with the mechanism through which acne occurs. In this regard, it turns out that acne occurs in two main ways. The first way through which acne occurs, and this is the most talked about mechanism for acne, is where the body detects the presence of the acne bacteria on the skin, and in response produces antibodies to combat these bacteria, with the anti-bodies so produced in turn producing a substance that causes the pimples and ultimately blemishes that characterize acne as we know. When we are looking at this first mechanism for acne, it would be expected that poor standards of skin hygiene would play a big role in attracting the bacteria that cause the acne, and indeed, people looking for advice on how to protect themselves from acne are usually advised to maintain high standards of hygiene, if only to make it harder for the bacteria that cause acne to find residence. What is important to note here, though, is that just maintaining high standards of hygiene doesn’t provide complete insurance against this mechanism for acne causation, because the bacteria that was described (and in whose reaction the body ends up manifesting acne) has been known to still go ahead and infect even people maintaining the highest standards of personal hygiene.

The second mechanism through which acne occurs, on the other hand, is where the hair follicles on the skin get entrapped inside the skin, leading to the release of the sebum with which they come attached deep inside the skin, with the sebum so released inside the skin having been known to cause some types of acne affliction, especially those that are characterized by those quite unsightly blackheads and whiteheads. It is towards this particular acne mechanism that skin care seems to have the greatest impact: because poor skin care practices (and utterly low standards of personal hygiene fall here) have been known to cause the blocking of the pores on the skin, ultimately leading to the inability of follicles on the skin to surface, and inevitably leading them to release the sebum in them inside the body – which lead to the acne.

So we can conclude that high standards of skin hygiene, while not an absolute insurance against acne, can nonetheless reduce one’s chances of falling victim to this distressing condition.

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