How many days/weeks will my irritated skin take to heal? (Photo)

Question

After I got my acne facial. My dermatologist offered me to use Tretinoin gel to remove my pimple marks. At first, it made my forehead and chin glossy, since those are the parts where my pimple marks is... One night, I accidentally put much amount of tretinoin on my cheeks that caused to redness, dryness, itchyness and irrated. How many weeks will I have to wait for this to heal? Or what are the effective remedies I can do?

Jason Emer, MD · Answer

I think its important you have appropriate skin care regimen that is customized to your skin and skin type, please see a cosmetic dermatologist who does combination treatments such as skin care, lasers, microneedling and radiofrequency.  Best, Dr. Emer.

John Louis Ratz, MD · Answer

Irritation from tretinoin is not unusual, especially when it's in the gel form. The first thing to do is stop the tretinoin. Then apply 1.0% hydrocortisone cream twice daily and gently rub it in well. Do this until the irritation is gone. Once you feel comfortable enough to resume tretinoin, start with the cream and not the gel, and start with the smallest concentration, 0.025%. If you get irritation from that, back off to every other day or every third day, and then increase when you no longer get irritation. Once you get to the point where you can apply it every night without problems, you can go to the next strength doing it the same way as you did the first time. Once tolerated, you can go to the 0.1% or try the gel again. It's perfectly OK to use moisturizers during this entire process. Check out what is available over the counter. Neutragena products are excellent, and you might consider starting there.            jlr

Anita Saluja, MD · Answer

For immediate help, I would use 1%
hydrocortisone cream twice daily for 3-7 days. Once better, resume tretinoin -
make sure no more than pea sized amount and add moisturizer with hyaluronic
acid, vitamin C, and/or green tea to also help decrease side effects. With
Obagi regimen, some of our patients add Hydrate moisturizer to their tretinoin
regimen.  Note - The skin will go through a short period
of side effects for a few weeks with the initial use of Tretinoin.  This
is normal.  It's important to continue use at minimum 5 days per week to
see the most effective results.  However, you might consider giving your
skin a rest the last 2 days of the week until the side effects begin to
subside.

How many days/weeks will my irritated skin take to heal? (Photo)

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How many days/weeks will my irritated skin take to heal? (Photo)

Answers (3)

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Everything you need to know about Retin-A

Our mission is to create a world where every investment in modern beauty is Worth It.