Guest guest Posted July 4, 2002 Report Share Posted July 4, 2002 Seven days isnt long enough to get the appropriate levels of tetracycline to help fight off acne. Any improvement you saw that quickly was probably purely coincidental. If in another 2-4 weeks you do not see noticable improvement, then the tetracycline has probably lost effectiveness for you. (bacteria can become resistant to particular antibiotics, and while cea is most likely not bacteria-related, acne definitely is.) This may turn out to be a blessing in disguise, because personally I don't believe long-term tetracycline use is as safe as people think (but this is just my own uninformed opinion). Adam Tetracycline > > About two and a half weeks ago, I began tetracycline treatment, > primarily to control the acne flares which have been persistent for a > few months. Initially, I had a positive response but have since about > day 7 slipped back to the point where I was before beginning the > treatment. In my teens, I responded very well to tetracycline > treatment for moderate acne. I am rather confused as to what is going on. > Deryk > > > > -- > Please read the list highlights before posting to the whole group (http://rosacea.ii.net/toc.html). Your post will be delayed if you don't give a meaningful subject or trim your reply text. You must change the subject when replying to a digest ! > > See http://www.drnase.com for info on his recently published book. > > To leave the list send an email to rosacea-support-unsubscribe > > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted July 4, 2002 Report Share Posted July 4, 2002 Seven days isnt long enough to get the appropriate levels of tetracycline to help fight off acne. Any improvement you saw that quickly was probably purely coincidental. If in another 2-4 weeks you do not see noticable improvement, then the tetracycline has probably lost effectiveness for you. (bacteria can become resistant to particular antibiotics, and while cea is most likely not bacteria-related, acne definitely is.) This may turn out to be a blessing in disguise, because personally I don't believe long-term tetracycline use is as safe as people think (but this is just my own uninformed opinion). Adam Tetracycline > > About two and a half weeks ago, I began tetracycline treatment, > primarily to control the acne flares which have been persistent for a > few months. Initially, I had a positive response but have since about > day 7 slipped back to the point where I was before beginning the > treatment. In my teens, I responded very well to tetracycline > treatment for moderate acne. I am rather confused as to what is going on. > Deryk > > > > -- > Please read the list highlights before posting to the whole group (http://rosacea.ii.net/toc.html). Your post will be delayed if you don't give a meaningful subject or trim your reply text. You must change the subject when replying to a digest ! > > See http://www.drnase.com for info on his recently published book. > > To leave the list send an email to rosacea-support-unsubscribe > > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted July 4, 2002 Report Share Posted July 4, 2002 > About two and a half weeks ago, I began tetracycline treatment, > primarily to control the acne flares which have been persistent for > a few months. Initially, I had a positive response but have since > about day 7 slipped back to the point where I was before beginning > the treatment. In my teens, I responded very well to tetracycline > treatment for moderate acne. I am rather confused as to what is > going on. First, Deryk, let's presume that the initial response had nothing to do with rosacea, but something to do with bacteria exacerbating common acne rather than having anything to do with rosacea (since there's no other known mechanism to explain a rapid response to oral antibiotics like you're describing). Let's also assume that it takes a good 6 weeks before a lack of response to rosacea is ruled out; in other words, that it isn't unusual at all for rosacea not to respond after only 2.5 weeks of oral tetracycline. Given that, I can think of at least two possibilities: 1- an initially therapeutic blood level of tetracycline was short- lived, dropping several days to a week later to subtherapeutic levels. Make certain you haven't snuck in calcium (dairy) or vitamin pills or antacids or other metal-containing substances two hours before or after taking the tetracycline; make certain you're taking it every 6 (or 12) hours, not just 4 (or twice) a day. 2- some other factor occuring several days into therapy caused a worsening of either your acne or your rosacea. For example, if you're living in hot weather like much of the US this past week, your pores may be responding to increased sweat and the physical stress. Tetracycline is not one of the antibiotics likely to cause early bug resistance but it's possible I suppose, if the other two more likely scenarios are eliminated. You could give the tetracycline another week to 10 days and see what happens; it takes several weeks to a month or more for the antibiotic level in the skin to reach therapeutic levels. Alternatively, you could give your dermatologist a call and ask about switching over to doxycycline or minocycline -- though if you have common acne you should first confirm with your dermatologist whether cross-resistance with tetracycline is a problem with those antibiotics. I don't know if it is. (Bug resistance wouldn't happen this way for rosacea since that's not the mechanism.) Hope that helps. Let us know what happens. Marjorie Marjorie Lazoff, MD Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted July 4, 2002 Report Share Posted July 4, 2002 > About two and a half weeks ago, I began tetracycline treatment, > primarily to control the acne flares which have been persistent for > a few months. Initially, I had a positive response but have since > about day 7 slipped back to the point where I was before beginning > the treatment. In my teens, I responded very well to tetracycline > treatment for moderate acne. I am rather confused as to what is > going on. First, Deryk, let's presume that the initial response had nothing to do with rosacea, but something to do with bacteria exacerbating common acne rather than having anything to do with rosacea (since there's no other known mechanism to explain a rapid response to oral antibiotics like you're describing). Let's also assume that it takes a good 6 weeks before a lack of response to rosacea is ruled out; in other words, that it isn't unusual at all for rosacea not to respond after only 2.5 weeks of oral tetracycline. Given that, I can think of at least two possibilities: 1- an initially therapeutic blood level of tetracycline was short- lived, dropping several days to a week later to subtherapeutic levels. Make certain you haven't snuck in calcium (dairy) or vitamin pills or antacids or other metal-containing substances two hours before or after taking the tetracycline; make certain you're taking it every 6 (or 12) hours, not just 4 (or twice) a day. 2- some other factor occuring several days into therapy caused a worsening of either your acne or your rosacea. For example, if you're living in hot weather like much of the US this past week, your pores may be responding to increased sweat and the physical stress. Tetracycline is not one of the antibiotics likely to cause early bug resistance but it's possible I suppose, if the other two more likely scenarios are eliminated. You could give the tetracycline another week to 10 days and see what happens; it takes several weeks to a month or more for the antibiotic level in the skin to reach therapeutic levels. Alternatively, you could give your dermatologist a call and ask about switching over to doxycycline or minocycline -- though if you have common acne you should first confirm with your dermatologist whether cross-resistance with tetracycline is a problem with those antibiotics. I don't know if it is. (Bug resistance wouldn't happen this way for rosacea since that's not the mechanism.) Hope that helps. Let us know what happens. Marjorie Marjorie Lazoff, MD Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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