I have suffered with back acne for over 20 years. I am 43 years old, and I really thought it was just something I was going to have to live with for the rest of my life. I've been to a couple of different dermatologists over the years for other conditions (warts, etc.) and I was basically told that the best thing was a strong benzoyl peroxide soap daily, etc.

Well, that never really seemed to work. The acne I have tends to be the cystic kind where I get big whiteheads which I invariably cannot resist scratching and popping. They are painful and annoying. But most of all, I was very self-conscious of them. I wouldn't go to a pool or the beach because I didn't want to be seen shirtless (not that my acne-free body would be much to look at anyways!).

Well, I finally saw a dermatologist who seems to have solved the problem. I wanted to share it with this forum in case it might help you, too. I went in to have him look at my acne, but I also had a couple of spots on my head (sun damage) that I wanted to have checked out (he froze those off right then and there!). After we discussed my problems with the bacne and my history, he basically explained that this is just a recurrent infection that will not go away. The OTC creams/soaps etc. will never address the underlying bacterial cause. He described it as folliculitis or furunculosis when a few of the follicles sort of merge together to become a super-zit.

He put my on a 10-day regimen of antibiotics. One was a mupirocin ointment that he had me apply to my nostrils (??). He said a lot of the same bacteria that cause acne tend to hang out in your nose, so trying to eliminate the spread of those as much as possible is key. Then he put my on two oral antibiotics. Dicloxacillin, which is a more general antibiotic. And then Rifampin, which he said was used to treat tuberculosis of all things. He basically described this as the "nuclear" approach. We are trying to wipe out the bacteria here that causes the acne in the first place. After that regimen, I am now on a 90-day prescription of Clindamycin.

I'm only about three weeks into this entire regimen (the 10-day nuclear option, and now about a week into the 90-day prescription), and all I can say is "WOW". It seems to have worked. My back is as clear as it has been in over 20 years.

I'm attaching two pictures. The first was on the first day of treatment. The second was about a week into it. You may not be able to tell a huge difference due to the various acne scars, etc. that I have, but I think you'll notice many of the larger cysts are gone. All I can say is that two weeks later, the changes are even that much more noticeable.