You may very well be one of the millions of people that suffer from acne. Acne can strike you when you are a teenager or a young adult, primarily, and may come and go over time. If you have ever experienced acne, you know that while it is not physically harmful, it can hurt your appearance and your social life. Like it or not, it is important to look good and acne can make it hard to do that. In most instances, your skin can be tended to by using an over the counter acne treatment that can be found in most stores. These treatments can come in a variety of forms such as a cream or a wipe.

When you purchase an over the counter acne treatment, you need to be sure of what you are buying. If you are at a pharmacy, ask the pharmacist for their opinion, if not look up information at your home. There are certain ingredients that are effective in battling your acne. By all account, the best ingredient in acne medicine is benzoyl peroxide. Benzoyl peroxide kills the bacteria underneath your skin, eliminates oil on your skin, and gets rid of dead cells. The downside is your face gets abnormally dry and red. Other good chemicals that can help clear up your acne include salicylic acid, sulfur and resorcinol, and alcohol. The majority of the over the counter acne treatments out there will have most of these compounds in it because they have been widely shown to clear up acne and kill the bacteria that causes it. Make sure you read up on customer reviews for certain products and read the labels about what is in each one. If you happen to find one that gets good customer reviews and has most of these ingredients, then you should purchase it because it will be effective.

It is also important to follow some other tips so you can maximize the effectiveness of the treatment and minimize any of the side effects. You should apply a moisturizer to protect against your skin drying out. Be sure to stay away from skin products with lots of oil in them, whether cosmetics or suntan lotions, because it will not help your acne situation. Do not over apply acne medicine because it can aggravate your skin even more than it already is. Lastly, do not squeeze or pick at your acne because that can make it worse and result in your skin becoming infected. If an over the counter acne treatment does not work for you, you should consider seeing a medical professional and getting a prescription strength medicine.