Hi girls!
I just want to share my experience with my dermatologist. Like many of you, I did quite a lot a research (read quite a bit of posts here in gt) before going to a particular dermatologist. I finally settled on the mother-daughter team of Dr. Sylvia Jacinto and Dr. Jasmin Jamora. And I must say that I am extremely pleased with them.
I went to them for my moderate acne which I had been suffering from since adolescence and for a port wine stain on my face (aka balat). For my acne, they gave me meds (mostly salicylic acid and clindamycin/tretinoin) and roaccutane (pulse treatment for 10 months). For my balat, I had 5 sessions of laser treatment (vbeam candela laser; once a month). Can I just say that the results are amazing! My balat is almost totally gone. It used to be an ugly dark pink stain on my cheek. Now, it's barely noticeable. My skin has also became much smoother because roaccutane helped eliminate my acne and control my oiliness. In fact, many friends have commented on my good skin.
However, be warned, roaccutane treatment is not to be undertaken lightly. While it is some sort of a wonder drug, it does have side effects which vary for each person. For me, I experienced chapped lips (lip balm lang katapat nyan) and extremely dry scalp (read - chunks of yucky dandruff). If you don't have severe acne, try topical meds first or ask you doctor about doing the low dose. Oh and make sure you don't plan on getting pregnant because you absolutely would not want to get pregnant while on roaccutane as it causes harm to the fetus. And finally, get a blood test first to check if you can take roaccutane. Something to do with the drug having an adverse effect on your liver. Your doctor should know what to do. If your doctor prescribes roaccutane without even requiring to see your blood test to clear you for treatment, matakot na kayo. I would advise changing your doctor.
Although Drs. Jacinto and Jamora are slightly more expensive than the other dermas, they're really good at what they do. Prior to them, I went to several skin/facial care centers and I ended up spending a lot of money for little or no results. At least kina Dr. Jamora, super sulit ng binayad ko sa kanila. All in all, I spent a total of about 50-60k (yeouch!) on meds, treatments and consultation fees for the past year. Yes, major investment talaga sya. Good skin does not come cheap! Dr. Jasmin Jamora has clinics at Makati Med, St. Luke's QC and The Skin Clinic in Makati. Just google her name for her contact details and clinic hours. I want to clarify that I am not being paid to do this nor did my doctor put me up to this. I'm simply very happy with their services. I know what it is like to have zero self-confidence because of acne and I just want to give you the push you need to get on the road to good skin
Matagal lang talaga and tyagaan but I promise you hindi nyo pagsisisihan.
Unfortunately, this past month, my hormones started acting up and I had some troubling break outs on my skin. Apparently, when you hit 30, your hormones go haywire again (and I thought we'd have been finished with this after puberty). I'll be using the topical meds again together with a daily dose of antibiotics. Hopefully, after 2 weeks my skin will be clear again. Otherwise, it's back to roaccutane for me. I'm soo not looking forward to that
My next project is treating my acne scars. I did 2 sessions of TCA peel with them and while I have seen good results, I don't like the long downtime (1 week of dark spots all over your face, about 2 weeks for the spots to completely fade). I'm considering the pearl fractional laser. Downtime is also about a week or longer but you only need 1 session to see a huge improvement. Has anyone tried pearl fractional? Any feedback? Sulit ba at 15k per session?
