If you are struggling with clogged pores or acne, facial extractions may be what you’ve been missing in your life. No matter your age, skin tone or stage in life, blemishes can pop up at any time and anywhere on the body. If you are tempted to pop and extract these blemishes yourself there is a chance you are making the problem worse and aggravating your skin. Extractions should be left to a medical aesthetician that can clear your compacted pores safely.

Let’s learn more about clogged pores. Clogged pores can actually be categorized and broken down by what stage they are in. If you look in a magnifying mirror and see small specks that are especially noticeable on the nose and chin, they are most like sebaceous filaments. Sebaceous filaments may be bothersome to look at but from an anatomy standpoint, they are not harmful whatsoever. They help guide oil and debris out of a pore or follicle.  Other small white or flesh colored bumps may be Milia or sebaceous hyperplasia, two other conditions that should only be diagnosed and treated by a medical professional in office. Comedones, more commonly known as clogged pores, can develop into flesh-colored bumps with heads on them aka “whiteheads” although they may not always be white. These occur when new skin forms over the clogged pore and further traps the dirt and debris. Clogged pores can evolve into an open comedone, commonly known as a blackhead. When the whitehead pushes through the surface of the skin to make room for all the junk it is carrying, the oil and dead skin mix is exposed to air which changes the flesh-colored head to a black or brown shade…aka a blackhead! If this blackhead isn’t extracted, the comedone will become inflamed and irritated causing it to rupture and boom: a pimple is created!