I always told myself that if I went on Accutane I would post a review on here. Even though I've been off of it for almost 8 months, I still wanted to stay true to my word, because I can remember spending hours on this site looking for answers. I was on the fence about Accutane for so long, close to two years. But after trying what felt like everything (topicals, diet, prescriptions) I finally gave in to my derms recommendation and got Accutane. I was adamant about a lower dose, longer course of treatment and was put on 40mg a day for close to a year. I researched that this treatment plan had lower incidences of severe side effects. During my course I only had dry skin, chapped lips, sun sensitivity, and the occasional nosebleed. I also had hair that never got greasy, and skin that never got oily. I miss that so much! After 2-3 months on Accutane my skin started healing. My stubborn forehead acne went away, and so did the cysts. My skin actually became more even and so friggin soft. I could finally leave the house without makeup, and without crying. Accutane was easily the best decision I ever made for myself and my only regret was that I didn't go on it sooner. I would not hesitate to recommend a low dose treatment to anyone that feels like they have tried everything. I know how emotionally painful acne is, I spent nights crying in my bathroom, cancelling plans, and cringing whenever I looked in the mirror before Accutane. It started affecting so many parts of my life that I felt I had no other choice. I'm so glad I chose Accutane. I wouldn't think twice about a second course if I ever felt I needed it again. Though the oil has come back along with the odd pimple here and there, my skin is so much better than it was before Accutane. I will admit it was close to perfect while on it, and I would love if I could have that all the time lol but such is life. I hope that you all find your magical cure. I'm here to tell you that it's possible. Whether that's Accutane or something else, I know you'll find it. Good luck to everyone suffering! I know how painful it is xoxo Tips for Accutane: Used cetaphil foaming cleanser Used cerave moisturizing cream Used Vaseline and polysporin for chapped lips! Poly was a life savor Used SPF 60 sunscreen Keep your regime as simple as possible. In the first week my skin felt like it was on fire lol put cold cloths in the fridge and then on my face!

I never write reviews for anything but I cannot praise this drug enough! I am 23 years old and I have suffered from acne for most of my teenage/adult years, admittedly it isn't the worst of the worst but it was enough to really knock my self confidence. I had a variety of under the skin spots, some cystic ones on my chin and some ones with huge whiteheads. My cheeks were the worst part of my face and I also started to get back acne, not what you want when you want to wear cute going out outfits. Things were at there worst at around May this year and I wouldn't even go to the beach without foundation on and I felt whenever people would look at me they would be thinking what terrible skin I have. At first I thought acne is something I would grow out of but it just didn't get any better no matter what product I used and the scaring was just dreadful. So I did a bit of research and was amazed at how costly places like the Skin clinic were and after reading reviews it seemed the treatments they were selling didn't even work!! So I went to my Doctors, I got prescribed Lymocycline (2 courses) & Duac, then Minocycline and Differin but to no avail. Then I came across Accutane, I can't even tell you how many Youtube videos I watched or how many reviews I read, particularly on acne.org. I put it of for a bit because i was so scared of the side effects, because lets face it they are pretty scary but then I guessed it bothered me enough to take the risk. So I waited paitently for my referral to the hospital, luckily I got my treatment on the NHS so I only had to pay the 8 pound a month for the prescription, I got one of those NHS 3 month cards at first and stocked up on prescription moisturisers as well. Started on 20mg a week for the first month and within the first week I just stopped getting any spots. It was amazing, no more looking in the mirror with dread! Then I was on 40mg for the rest of my treatment, and my scars started to diminish as well to the point where I know have pretty much flawless skin for the first time in so so long. I was lucky I didn't really get many side effects, I had the occasional headache and like most people super dry skin but that was fine with me as long as I didn't have spots! The Dermatologist gave me Dermol 500 & Double base which I really recommend as a moisturiser as they come in huge tubs with a super handy pump! At home i would mix my Demol 500 with a bit of Bio Oil as it made my skin feel so much nicer and I felt I had to moisturise less. I was forever putting stuff on my lips, the main thing I used was Vaseline! As you can buy super large tubs and then I would fill my empty Carmex pot up with it, cheap and did the trick! Never got cracked or bleeding lips. There are also amazing benefits of having super dry skin such as my foundation / tinted moisturiser lasted literally all day, before I would put a super heavy layer of foundation and a few hours later it had vanished of my face. Now I was able to get away with a tinted moisturiser that would last all day! I also had to wash my hair far less, went from washing it every other day to once a week! I have super long hair so this was a major benefit to me. I know this is a long review but I just cannot praise Accutane enough despite all the bad press it gets!! It changed my life and reading reviews on pages such as this is really what persuaded me to bite the bullet and go for it! So please really do consider it an option, I know the side effects are scary but they are very rare! There is nothing as effective as this in such a short space of time on the market and especially if you live in the UK and can go on the NHS it is very inexpensive. If you can I would also recommend starting Accutane in the winter months, it is just a lot more reassuring not having to worry about sun exposure!

This cleared up ALL of my acne on my face and body! I'm so happy I can not have to worry about constantly putting creams on my face and such. I experienced chapped lips the most and some bloody noses but totally worth it because acne controlled my life!

I have SUFFFFFFEREEDDDDD from severe cystic acne for 11 years and have been on and off lots of medication for this. Accutane cleared my skin within the first MONTH of me taking it!! And I mean I have very scarred up skin now but its clear as day and I haven't had a breakout and it's been over a year since I stopped taking it. I'm a 140 pound female and I was on 80 mg daily of accutane. I had zero side effects except that I had overly dry eyes but I had lazer eye surgery that year as well so it was a really bad combination so look into that if you have had lazer eye surgery accutane will mess with your eyes to the point where it is really uncomfortable. Either than that I highly recommend this to anyone suffering from acne. I hated my life when I was covered in zits but now I'm able to live a confident, happy, normal life because of this drug :)

Unlike many people, I received no side-effects from Accutane aside from poor night vision and obviously dry skin. While I was taking Accutane (I was 14 and/or 15) my acne was 100% gone. Sadly, it did come back and it was still fairly bad, but it wasn't nearly as bad as it used to be. I honestly have no idea why I didn't go back on this stuff. It worked great and I had no problems with it. I should've gone back on it when my acne returned. I was told my acne would return to a certain extent, but I think mine was a little worse than necessary. When I first started taking Accutane, my acne got worse for about a month. Don't worry: this is normal. I also want to add that I had no scarring afterwards.

I read loads of reviews the first time I thought about taking Accutane and freaked myself out. If I have started it then I wouldn't have gotten 100 times worse and been driven deeper into depression. My only regret is that I didn't take it sooner. My side effects were normal. Dry nose, lips and sometimes eyes. I bought Elizabeth Arden 8 hour cream on ebay for 13 euro usually 34 in store and it is amazing. It's basically, I think, a nicer smelling Vaseline. I found it worked a lot better to, but that's just me. Use it on your lips nose and skin. It's unreal made my Accutane journey a lot easier. I know when I read all the side effects I thought no way, but if you buy any drug they all have side effects the length of your arm. Some people don't feel any side effects. I was very lucky. My back was sore the first few months but I started Pilates on youtube and it helped. Also mind your teeth! Stay strong!!!

First I wanted to say that all of the people who leave bad reviews on here who have never actually taken the drug and are not a qualified professional - do you realize that you could be impacting someones life in a major and negative way? I recommend to those considering going on Isotretinoin not to read those kinds of reviews. I think its a shame that people still view not wanting to have acne as a egotistical and conceited thing, when in fact having acne can be as debilitating as having any other mental or physical diseases. For me, having acne slowly took pieces of me away. I lost my self confidence, my relationships with others were strained, I didn't want to do a lot of the things I used to love. I was deeply depressed and I took it out on the people I loved, further alienating myself from human contact and support. I stopped looking at people hoping that they wouldn't look at me in return. And still people would tell me that my acne wasn't that big of a deal and I shouldn't worry about it so much and my all time favorite "why don't you just cover it up with makeup?". All of those things were supposed to be helpful, I know, but in reality they actually hurt more than helped because they made me feel like I didn't have a right to feel bad about the state of my own skin. Yes, women can cover up acne with makeup (if you're really good at if, which I never was) but makeup isn't supposed to be a shaming tool right? Its supposed to be fun, but for me it was a dreaded daily experience. Sorry to rant, I just want to say to anyone reading this that ITS OKAY to feel bad about your skin and don't let anyone tell you that you aren't entitled to your own feelings! I have been off of accutane for 10 weeks now and the past half year of my life has been a total turn around, I feel like I'm finally living, instead of just getting through the days. My acne was bad but it was not as bad as I have seen on these boards - I had acne ALL over my face, but the brunt of it was on my cheeks and forehead. I got everything from cystic acne to tiny bumps under the skin that never seemed to go away. My acne started in my teen years but it didn't really get that bad until my mid-twenties (when everyone around me seemed to finally have perfect skin :( ) I tried everything under the sun for years, from prescription to holistic. Finally, when I moved to a different city and got a new derm, I had had enough and she agreed that at 26 years old my skin needed a break before permanent damage was done. She put me on Absorica and since I'm only 5ft and only weigh 96 lbs my dosage was pretty low (never more than 40 mg a day). I was on it for 6 months and started to see my skin clearing by the 3rd month. I wasn't totally clear by month 6, but I attribute that to my "free and do nothing to my skin" attitude at that time (I think I had like 2 tiny pimples when I took my final pill). I've been off of it for 10 weeks now and as I sit here typing I have 2 tiny whiteheads. Now a days when I get pimples they go away lightning fast, and I haven't had any major breakouts. My skin healed up fine while I was on Absorica, I know many people say your skin heals slower but when I finished my dose most of my acne marks had faded completely. I still get a bit of redness and I have some pores that will never go back to a small normal looking size but I get compliments on my skin all the time now. I especially love not having to wear foundation (I never liked the feeling of it on my skin). I would strongly recommend the following products during treatment: -Vaseline (for inside of your nose, otherwise you will get nosebleeds) -Carmex chapstick (the only brand that actually relived my dryness) -A very gentle cleanser (I used the Paulas Choice skin balancing one) -Sunscreen (I'm serious about sunscreen care, I think if you care about your skin you need to wear sun screen every day but you especially need it while on accutane otherwise you will burn and damage your skin --I love Kiss My Face hydrating sunscreen, I still use it) -I also used a textured cloth about every 3rd day to wash my face with - I found that my skin peeled and shed so much while I was on actuate I had to get it off somehow otherwise my whole face would look very flaky) **Lotion - I used Paulas Choice skin recovery lotion but very sparingly because I hate putting tons of stuff on my face before going to sleep Optional: Probiotics, I took them and still take them now because I find they help my digestion and I think they played a big role in keeping my stomach in good shape while on accutane. I really like the Target brand chewable ones. Heating pad: my back, especially my spine hurt so much during the last two months of accutane, but a heating pad really helped to soothe it. As for side effects, all of my side effects went away in about a month (after stopping), the only one that remains is that the oil glands in my eyes dried up and are still causing me to have dry eyes. Per advice from my eye doctors, I do warm compresses on my eyes to release the dried up oils in my eyes and its mostly fine, but I definitely can't wear my contacts for 12 hours a day, everyday anymore (not that I really used to). I have had to cut back to wearing my contacts 3 days a weeks if I want to be comfortable. If you find yourself getting eye styes during treatment or having dry eyes, I would highly recommend doing warm compresses and taking fish oil (or any kind of omega-3). For the most part I still use all of the same products now that I was using while on absorica, but I have added an AHA (Paulas Choice again) to my routine as a spot treatment or all over when I feel like my skin has a lot of build up on it. I really don't HAVE to do anything other than wash my face and use a little lotion to have nice looking skin though. Sorry to post such a long review, I have been thinking about it in my head for a long time. I hope it helps someone out there to read and know you are not alone in your struggles! If I had to go on Accutane/isotretinoin/Absorica again I WOULD!

This is the only product that can help me The creams,gels didn't work for me,my acne was so bad and my face was really greasy and my hair too,now my face it's normal but i have to use sunscreen and moustrizer but it's nothing compared to the past

I had bad acne, but when I was put on accutane the "oh it will get worse then better" routine... was HORRIBLE. I still have scars on my cheeks and temples that I know were from the implosion of the accutane. My doctor took me off it after a few months. THANK GOD! I was begging to be put on it, because the commercials made it seem like the holy grail. But It was horrible, huge mistake. Glad they took me off it.

Personal background: I had mild/moderate hormonal acne that was causing me a great deal of angst. I had tried benzoyl peroxide, differin, salicylic acid, azelaic acid, manuka honey, spironolactone, BC pill, microdermabrasion etc. while all of these treatments worked to some extent, nothing was perfect. Isotretinoin course: I am 40kg so I started on 10mg per day. After 3 weeks I had an initial breakout ' the worst of which lasted a month. The initial breakout is 100% worth it, it wasn't much worse than a regular breakout, only there were a few cysts. By the 5th month my skin was clear. I gradually increased my dosage over the course of a year until I was taking 40mg per day. I reached the recommended total cumulative dose of 120mg per kg, took a break from the medication for 2 months and then began an ultra low-dose maintenance course (approx. 10-20mg per week) for another year. Side effects: dry eyes, temporary joint pain (not recommended for serious athletes), dry skin, chelitis Result: 2 years later, my skin is like porcelain. I am regularly complimented on my skin by strangers who would never have guessed I had acne. The hyperpigmentation is gone. The texture of my skin is vastly improved (smooth, less oily, no redness, firmer, brighter). I still get the occasional tiny pimple once a month ' I just apply a dab of Savlon antiseptic cream. Recommended products: Bourjois healthy mix foundation, Sukin moisturiser, hydrocortisone, Sudocreme or zinc oxide (for scars and hyperpigmentation), zinc supplements, fish oil, light AHA face wash, Savlon. Consume isotretinoin with a fatty meal. Please message me with any questions, more than happy to help. I will never forget the psychological damage that my acne caused me.