Clinical and Medical Investigations

Review Article ISSN: 2398-5763

Significant improvements of acne after treatment with

homeopathic medicines
Swami Shraddhamayananda* and AK Pradhan
Ramakrishna Mission Medical Unit, Belur Math, Howrah, West Bengal, India

Abstract
Acne is a common disease of the teenage population causing cosmetic disfigurements as well as many psychological problems in the affected persons. The main
pathogenesis of the disease is the involvements of the oil glands at the base of hair follicles. The clinical lesions are usually papules and pustules over face, forehead,
chest and back. In many cases, conventional treatment fails and the patients become helpless in this condition. Thus, in this study a possible curative role of
homeopathic medicines was explored in such cases based on a pilot study done earlier at our Institute. A group of 400 such cases were enrolled in the study after
consideration of all ethical issues and following inclusion and exclusion criteria formulated at our Institute. There were also a control group of 30 cases, where only
placebo was given which were similar in appearance containing only vehicle of the medicine. Only a single oral homeopathic medicine out of two medicines “sulphur”
or “tuberculinum” was given in the test group based on clinical case history as observed in the pilot study. No local application was used in the study. Out of 400 cases
387 (96.75%) cases showed significant improvements within 6 months of treatment including cure in many cases within 3 months. The control group showed no
changes even after 6 months. The results indicate a promising role of homeopathic medicines in such difficult cases.

Introduction gives relief to the patients of acne but it is expensive and patients
suffer for a long time and often not without complications. Most of
Acne vulgaris, a disease commonly occurs in adolescents is the patients in this study came after prolonged conventional treatment
a chronic inflammatory disease characterized by formation of (6 months to 3 years) without any significant benefit. Considering all
comedones, papules, pustules, cysts, nodules and even in some cases the above-mentioned facts, we treated these patients with homeopathic
it leads to scar formation. Although in many cases it is very difficult medicines which are alternative medicines without any side effects as
to find the exact etiology of this disease, but it is often associated these medicines are used in ultra-diluted forms and as homeopathic
with follicular hyperkeratosis, hyper secretion of sebaceous glands, pharmacopoeia is approved in many nations/countries including India
Propionibacterium acnes colonization, hypersensitivity and chronic where this study was made and medicines are available in India over the
inflammatory reactions. In general, hormones e.g., excess secretion of counters easily and this method of treatment is accepted by the patients
androgen; as it stimulates the oil gland and increased sebum secretion very easily. Details of homeopathy and medicines used in homeopathic
and progesterone which also increases sebum secretion while estrogen practice are available elsewhere.
reduces it, but the vast majority, patients with acne have normal
endocrine profile; excessive sebum, that can breakdown cellular wall (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeopathy; https://abchomeopathy.
causing bacteria to grow (Propionibacteria); hereditary/genetic factors com/taking.htm )
e.g., a positive family history in many cases are commonly found. In our
Pathogenesis of acne
clinic 5% cases have positive family history. In some cases, conventional
medicines like lithium; and pregnancy because of hormonal change are Pathogenesis of acne is not well understood. There are multiple
also blamed for development of acne.
Acne commonly affects face, anterior chest, and upper part of back Table 1. Types of acne.

[1]. Its prevalence in students above 10 years of age varies between Inflammatory Non-Inflammatory
16.33-27.2% and in adolescents it varies between 28.9-93.3% [2-7]. It Papules (pinheads) Open comedones (Black heads)
usually begins in the teen age years (between 12 and 18 years) and lasts Pustules (pimples) Closed comedones (white heads).
for 5-10 years. It may persist in adulthood (beyond 30 years). Male and Nodules (cyst)
female are equally affected. High glycaemic load diet and milk products Excorice (eroded papule)
may be important exciting factors. Different types of acne are given in
Table 1. Differential Diagnosis of acne should be done with keratosis
pillaris, rosacea and chloracne. Correspondence to: Swami Shraddhamayananda, Ramakrishna Mission
Medical Unit, Belur Math, Howrah, West Bengal, India, Tel:91-9143415986;
Conventional treatment of acne is usually done with resorcinol,
E-mail: [email protected]
benzyl peroxide, salicylic acid, sulphur, retin-A, antibiotics like
erythromycin, oxytetracycline etc. Hormonal and laser therapy are Received: November 14, 2016; Accepted: December 07, 2016; Published:
done in selected cases. Though the conventional method of treatment December 30, 2016

Clin Med Invest, 2016 doi: 10.15761/CMI.1000117 Volume 1(3): 1-3

 Shraddhamayananda S (2016) Significant improvements of acne after treatment with homeopathic medicines

factors like excess sebum production, androgen activity, bacterial Results and discussion
colonisation, alteration of quality of sebum lipids and follicular
hyperkeratinization etc. may responsible for this changes. These leads Earliest response was seen in majority number cases after 7 days
to erythema, hyperpigmentation, atrophic and hypertrophic changes. and 387 patients were improved within 3 months. No response was
noticed in 13 cases after 6 months of treatment. After two years follow
Materials and methods up we have seen relapse in 16 cases. In placebo cases after 2 months
follow up, out of 30 patients eruptions were increased in 18 patients
The patients and no change occurred in remaining 12 patients. Details of the results
Total 400 patients were enrolled in this study. There were also 30 are given in Table 3 and in Figures 1-4 (Before and after treatment).
control cases those were given placebo and followed for two months This study indicated a definite role of homeopathic medicines in the
to see if there was any change. Most of them aged between 13 to 22 treatment of acne, not only come done but also against inflammatory
years (78 %), their mean age was 18 years. Beyond 40 years of age there
was only few female patients (2% of total patients). Age distribution of
patients is given in Figure 5. Male: Female ratio was ~1: 1. All patients
were diagnosed, categorized, and followed up by our dermatologist of
the Institution. The patients were enrolled after taking consent from
the patients or from their parents. Permission of this study was also
taken from Ethical committee of the Institute. Multiple open come
done (non-inflammatory), multiple closed comedones, papule, and
pustule (with moderate inflammation), multiple pustules and cysts (in
inflammatory acne), severe inflammatory acne on forehead/central
forehead/ nose/ chin - all these varieties of patients were treated. As
most of the patients came after prolonged conventional treatment so
in most of the cases all types of comedones were observed. In most of Figure 2. Severe acne vulgaris with cystic changes.
the cases face was commonly involved and although in 224 cases the
patients could not remember the age of onset, among remaining 176
cases the age of onset was in between 14-17 years (Table 2 and Figure 6).
Homoeopathic medicines and treatment
The same medicines were given to all the patients except in the
control group where only lactose pills were given which looks similar
to our medicines and lactose was the vehicle of these medicines. The
medicine was purchased from reputed homeopathic medicine shop
(HAPCO) in Kolkata. In the placebo group there were 15 males and
15 females. Random selection was done of both sexes, of different casts
and ages. Medicines were given as 4 pills (one dose) daily for 7 days then
one dose in 15 days intervals. Only single oral homeopathic medicine Figure 3. Acne with hyperpigmentation.
(either “Sulphur” or “Tuberculinum”) were used orally without any
local application.

Figure 4. Repeated Acne with cystic changes.

Figure 1. Acne with severe infection and sinus.

Table 2. Number and percentage of patients with acne, regarding affected area and age of
onset.

Area Age of onset

Face (384, 96.0%) ≤ 9 years (16 cases)
Face and trunk (12, 3.0%) 10 years (16 cases)
Trunk (4, 1.0%) 11 years (24 cases)
12 years (20 cases)
13 years (20 cases)
14 – 17 years (80 cases)
Not known (224 cases) Figure 5. Age distribution of acne cases.

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 Shraddhamayananda S (2016) Significant improvements of acne after treatment with homeopathic medicines

Table 3. Acne according to severity and their outcome of treatment.

Severity Age range Sex Outcome of treatment Original scoring in Scoring in acne
in years acne with scar with scar after
Male Female Remission time No remission treatment
Acne inflammatory
(papule, pustule, nodule)

18-25 76 80 2-3 months 1 - -

Acne comedonal, noninflammatory

12-22 22 22 1 month - -

Acne with scar Moderate - 172

Severe- 20
Very severe- 8
20-45 96 104 6-12 months 11 (Average scoring 0
3.6)

References
1. Shen Y, Wang T, Zhou C, Wang X, Ding X, et al. (2012) Prevalence of acne vulgaris
in Chinese adolescents and adults: a community-based study of 17,345 subjects in six
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2. Kilkenny M, Merlin K, Plunkett A, Marks R (1998) The prevalence of common skin

conditions in Australian school students: 3. acne vulgaris. Br J Dermatol 139: 840-845.
[Crossref]

3. Cunliffe WJ, Gould DJ (1979) Prevalence of facial acne vulgaris in late adolescence
and in adults. Br Med J 1: 1109-1110. [Crossref]

4. Smithard A, Glazebrook C, Williams HC (2001) Acne prevalence, knowledge about

acne and psychological morbidity in mid-adolescence: a community-based study. Br J
Dermatol 145: 274-279. [Crossref]
Figure 6. Graph showing onset time of acne.
5. Goulden V, Stables GI, Cunliffe WJ (1999) Prevalence of facial acne in adults. J Am
Acad Dermatol 41: 577-580. [Crossref]
acne cases. Probably the most interesting finding in this study is
remission of acne associated with scars. The average scoring of 3.6 6. Dréno B (2010) Recent data on epidemiology of acne. Ann Dermatol Venereol 137
Suppl 2: S49-51. [Crossref]
of the scar associated acne became zero scoring after the treatment.
The real mechanism of action of these homeopathic medicines is very 7. Law MP, Chuh AA, Lee A, Molinari N (2010) Acne prevalence and beyond: acne
difficult to explain and so far, there is no definite explanation of the disability and its predictive factors among Chinese late adolescents in Hong Kong. Clin
Exp Dermatol 35: 16-21. [Crossref]
mechanism of action of these medicines. Thus possible attempts should
be made in future studies to find out the mechanism. This preliminary
report may help the suffering humanity at large.

Copyright: ©2016 Shraddhamayananda S. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits
unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Clin Med Invest, 2016 doi: 10.15761/CMI.1000117 Volume 1(3): 3-3