Tetracycline antibiotics for the Treatment of Acne

Discovered in the late 1940s, tetracyclines are a family of broad-spectrum antibiotics used to treat a wide range of bacterial infections. The original tetracyclines were obtained from Streptomyces bacteria but are newer semisynthetic derivatives.

The oral antibiotics tetracycline are the workhorses in acne therapy.
They are the first line oral acne drugs of choice in the management of moderate to severe acne. They were the first widely prescribed by dermatologists in the early 1950s when it was discovered that they were effective as a treatment for acne.

Oral Antibiotics work to reduce the population of P. acnes (a factor that contributes to acne), which, in turn, reduces inflammation.

Tetracyclines exert their bacteriostatic effect by inhibiting protein synthesis in bacteria. Besides these contrabacterianos effects, tetracyclines have strong anti-inflammatory properties.

Tetracycline is the most widely prescribed antibiotics for acne. A typical regimen of tetracycline for the treatment of moderate to severe acne is initiated with a dose of 500 to 1000 mg per day, which decreases as improvement occurs. Long term, low doses of tetracycline therapy may continue for many months to remove acne. Higher doses may be prescribed for severe acne. The main drawback of this acne is to be taken on an empty stomach to be the most effective.

Two synthetic tetracycline derivatives is used to treat acne are minocycline and doxycycline.

Doxycycline it particularly effective in the treatment of inflammatory acne. This acne is often used for people who do not respond or can not tolerate erythromycin or tetracycline. The starting dose of doxycycline in 50 to 100 mg twice daily. It should be taken with food, otherwise it can cause nausea. Doxycycline is more likely than tetracycline to increase sensitivity to the sun, or cause sunburns.

Minocyline has a long history of use in the treatment of acne. It is often effective in treating acne that has not responded to other oral antibiotics. Minocycline is especially useful for pustular type acne. Also it seems to produce fewer incidents of resistance to antibiotics. However, minocycline accounts serious side effects more frequently than other tetracyclines.

In particular, this drug can cause rare but seriouse side effects such as lupus-like syndrome, serum sickness reaction (SSLR) and secondary intracranial hypertension.

Summary This confirms the effectiveness of tetracycline in the treatment of acne vulgaris.

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