Where do you start?

The best place to start is to consider the 2 main questions below. Answering these questions can greatly reduce the amount of experimentation you need to perform in order to find the best treatment.

1. Skin type

Determining what kind of skin type you have will be a big help on how to treat acne problems. If your not sure what type of skin you have, many of the department stores can do a test for you or you can seek a dermatologists opinion.

Skin types can be normal, oily, dry, combination or sensitive. There's a big difference in treating oily skin to treating dry skin, for example, so it really is important to know the skin you're in. Be sure to note whether your skin type changes at different times of the month or year so that you can adapt your regime to suit your skin's condition.

2. Severity

Acne is an umbrella phrase to include all forms of menacing spots. You have blackheads, whiteheads, pus filled pimples and cystic forms of acne which all don't respond to the same treatment.

For mild to moderate problems you might simply need an overnight treatment but for more severe cases you may need a more thorough remedy that may have to be used for several months to see results. Severe forms may even require advanced treatments like laser or photo therapy to treat acne.