Does Sugar Cause Acne?

My patients often ask me if what they eat can affect their acne.  The short answer is "yes", but the longer answer is that - unfortunately - not enough research is done on diet and acne.  The research is hard to do because people are notoriously bad at reporting honestly everything they ate and drank, and also because most research is funded by pharmaceutical companies which are more interested in selling their product than seeing if diet can affect acne.  There are some studies related to food and/ or supplement consumption and acne, and other studies have looked at nutrient / vitamin deficiencies in the blood of acne patients.  Still it would be beneficial to have more studies.

There is some evidence that excess sugar can lead to more acne lesions and more inflammation within the acne lesions.  The exact mechanism is not known, but excess sugar leads to a spike in insulin, which mimics a molecule called insulin-like growth factor, which can lead to more skin-cell growth in the pore and more sebum production, which in turn can lead to a clogged pore - the first step of all acne lesions.  Also, high sugar diets have been linked to inflammation, and the more inflammation in an acne lesion, the larger it is.  The best drink when you are thirsty is good, old-fashioned water.  In fact, staying hydrated with water will likely keep you from craving those sugary drinks.  Try to cut out all sugary drinks completely if you can, not just sodas but juices as well.  The reason that sugary drinks are important to eliminate is because insulin spikes more if sugar is consumed "straight" - when consumed with other foods the rate at which sugar is absorbed into the bloodstream is slower.  So eat the apple- the fiber will help to slow the sugar absorption, plus you can only eat an apple so fast- and ditch the apple juice.

Products like AcNiac work by decreasing inflammation, but the less inflammation there is to begin with, the better for your skin.