Acne

Our beautician Amélie wants to understand the effects of birth control pills on the body.

"I sometimes have clients with beautiful skin. Then I see them again, their faces invaded by spots, especially, like I had, on the cheeks, jaws and neck and even a lot on the décolleté and back... They then stopped taking birth control pills, some after more than 10 years. They no longer have their periods (without being 30 years old). As for acne, as long as their system is unbalanced it is difficult to treat it. "

She would like to understand, knowing from having been there, how much pain it causes, and how we want to hide our faces when we suffer from acne.

So I asked Dr. Cordeau to enlighten us on the subject:

"I'll answer you briefly because your question is very complex and I have very little information about your patient. So I'll answer in a more general way.

Acne takes many forms (inflammatory type, pustular type, etc.) and has multiple causes, whether hormonal or otherwise (i.e. diet, stress, exposure to chemicals, etc.). In general, when a woman responds well to birth control pills (containing estrogen and progesterone) and her acne seems to improve with them, it could be (this is not always the case) that there is a "surplus" of androgen hormones in her. These hormones can promote the production of sebum and therefore promote acne (they have many other actions as well). The estrogens contained in birth control pills decrease the action of androgen hormones and can therefore reduce the manifestation of acne. But be careful! Many women have completely normal androgen levels and still suffer from acne (and still respond to birth control pills). And even if we wanted to measure androgen hormones (which turn into testosterone), many women end up with normal levels and a lot of acne, so the relationship is not entirely linear.

Dr. Karyne Cordeau