Hello Everyone

Although I am new here, I have suffered from varying degrees of acne over the past few years. In fact I am 30 now, and still suffer from mild outbreaks. Mainly white heads around the shaving region, but also as an aside (Seb Derm). The most difficult aspect of acne, no matter how severe or insignificant is without a doubt the psycological effects it can have.

I have used the regime before. Mostly, after sticking with it - by the book. I have seen good results. The only problems that do arise, I find - is the ease to slip off the regime. It is quite time consuming to keep up - especially when you are living with a partner and you are concious around them. Another problem that I find, and perhaps a few others will too is BP does bleach clothing. It is quite embarrasing when I've gone to use towels, thinking I have been aboslutley clear of BP to find days later that patches have appeared and have ruined towels.

So although the regime does significantly reduce acne - is it really a long-term solution?

What I mean by this, can we feasibly continue to use it year after year after year - into adulthood? Can we stop the regime eventually and be free of acne? I don't know the answer, perhaps with coincidence yes. But I don't know.

I have recently ran out of Dans BP and because the postage is so high to ship to the UK, I have had to try and find a temporary solution or fix. I located a product called Panoxyl 2% BP. Essentially the same or similar to dans, but in smaller tubes. It does not absorb into the skin as efficiently as Dans BP, nor does it seem to do as good a job. Could it be because of the Sodium Lauryl Sulphate base? SLS is generally, as far as I am aware - not good for the skin - yet they put it in a 2% BP gel?

Anyway, my skin is sporadic right now. One moment I will have a few days clear and then the white heads will return again - usually after shaving admitedly.

I've recently stumbled across a product called Pantothen which works by attacking an acne problem from the source. The theory is below and quoted:

"

Coenzyme-A breaks down excess oil in your skin before it turns into acne. Unfortunately, the body only produces enough Coenzyme-A to deal with a normal amount of oil. When your body's oil production increases, there is usually not enough Coenzyme-A to deal with it before infection occurs.

Coenzyme-A is made of two distinct molecules - adenine triphosphate and pantothenic acid. The good news is that your body is filled with adenine triphosphate. So, as soon as you put more pantothenic acid into your body, it will bind with the adenine triphosphate and naturally create more Coenzyme-A. The additional Coenzyme-A then destroys the excess oils in your skin, making acne a thing of the past.

But, there's more. It's not enough simply to make your body create more Coenzyme-A; you need to direct the oils to Coenzyme-A to get them broken down. One way is to simply flood your body with high levels of pantothenic acid, but that can lead to stomach problems and bloating.

We found out that a better way is to send the oils down the body's natural pathway to Coenzyme-A. The body naturally uses L-Carnitine to move oils to Coenzyme-A glands. But, your body usually doesn't have enough L-Carnitine to deal with excess oil.

Therefore, our research team combined pantothenic acid with L-Carnitine to form "Pantothen'. They found that this newly formulated combination works very efficiently in breaking down oils in the skin and preventing acne from breaking out."

Taking this into account, has anyone of here tried this 'very effective' treatment? Apparently Pantothenic Acid is the way forward, it attacks acne from the inside, reduces oil and other topical treatments such as BP only work to reduce and temporarily improve? I haven't tried it, but for £29 for a months supply of capsules or £58 for 3 months and a 100% money back guarentee. I might just give it a go and let you know what results I get.

If it helps me, I will shout from the roof top and share the wonderful news.