Accutane: Yay or Nay?

If you have never had acne or come across cystic acne then you may be forgiven for belittling the effects of this condition. Acne can cause shame and embarrassment amongst its sufferers resulting in depression, anxiety and much introversion. The type of acne Accutane is indicated for is the severe cystic acne type which can be quite disfiguring due to pus-filled lesions that leave behind pitted scarring.

Accutane has been the much hailed panacea for the past decades; the cure to end all cures for acne; providing much hope for those living and suffering through this condition. It is indeed highly effective, however at what cost ?

The company Roche has repeatedly attempted to suppress information about the early development of the drug. The chemical compound 13-cis retinoic acid was first studied by Dr Werner Bollag in the 1960’s as an agent to treat skin cancer but discovered in 1971 that it could in fact cure acne. However he abandoned the project (for acne treatment ) once he found that it could cause disastrous birth defects. The research was once again picked up in 1975 to study the compound for lamellar itchthyosis which led to discovering its tremendous curative affects at clearing acne.

Further development led to the manufacture of Accutane. Although its detrimental effects on unborn offspring in animal studies were well known, by manipulating the research (contraception for the test subjects were made mandatory, and ensuring that the one subject who fell pregnant carried out an abortion) they managed to label the drug as ‘effects on pregnant women have not been studied’, and fast-tracked its licensing in record time (shock to many).

What ensued has been almost three decades of real world research in the clinics of dermatologists. Due to its lax labelling women did go on to give birth to babies with serious defects and that is if they managed to hold the pregnancy at all to begin with whilst being on Accutane.

The shocking news is that if Accutane is consumed a short time before becoming pregnant then the same risk factors exist. A women having taken this drug is not allowed to donate blood for some time after it.

The list of other side-effects remain extremely long; too long for the purpose of this article. However I must mention depression, psychosis, suicidal tendencies, IBS, ulcerative colitis, infertility, muscoloskletal and eye damage as some of these side-effects.

The question is as to whether the benefits outweigh the risks (certainly much of it still unknown whilst patients act as lab rats) specially seeing that dermatologist are now prescribing the drug for milder cases of acne ?

‘My life changed the day I started taking Accutane. My body fell into sepsis which I was fortunate to reverse. My immune system never recovered with months of infections following my discharge from the hospital which had me back in the doctor’s clinic weekly. I was then prescribed Zoloft for the depression I felt which has had many adverse affects on my body. The irony is that my acne has now come back but my body never has’ Anna, 29 years old, Tennessee USA. I hope to change her story in the coming months.

Would love to hear your story if you have been a victim of Accutane.