Rethinking Accutane: Accutane’s excessive regulations and extreme doses should be changed

A third of my left eyebrow was gone.

I looked into my Snapchat camera and saw random strands of black hair and bare skin where my eyebrow used to be.

Frantically, I tried to figure out what happened. The only logical explanation was the Accutane I had been taking — a “moderate dose” of 40 mg every night for the past four months.

Accutane is meant to help teenagers battle acne and feel confident. But between the unnecessarily high doses and excessive regulations, it’s more than just swallowing a pill each night.

As girls, we’re required to take two forms of contraceptives that come with their own side effects — weight gain, mood swings, bloating and risk of blood clots — even if we’re not sexually active.

After struggling with peeling skin and hair loss on a standard 40 mg dose, I started taking Accutane every other day. My doctor eventually lowered my dose to 10 mg, which worked just as well with no additional side effects like nausea and mood swings.

Physicians should be more cautious when prescribing high doses of Accutane to teenagers. Accutane is equally effective — and doesn’t have severe side effects — when taken at a lower dose, according to the National Library of Medicine.

Being on Accutane means answering 15 questions monthly, through iPLEDGE, an Accutane monitoring program. Then, peeing 30 mL into a cup for a pregnancy test every month. While taking Accutane as an eighth-grader, I didn’t understand why I had to take so many tests. I was moody, had cheilitis — the inflammation of chapped lips — and had to buy two eyebrow pencils to fill in what was missing.

According to the National Library of Medicine, valproic acid, a medication that treats seizures, shouldn’t be taken while pregnant, but there’s no required survey to fill out. Instead of using needless tests to confirm a minor is not pregnant, there should be more education regarding the risks of pregnancy while on Accutane.

At CVS, picking up my prescription was confusing because the pharmacist had to call their supervisor to figure out the iPLEDGE rules. And monthly appointments with my dermatologist meant taking two hours that consisted of sitting in the waiting room, making small talk with the doctor, and peeing into a cup to confirm that I wasn’t pregnant — a conversation that could’ve taken seconds.

Clear warnings on Accutane packaging about the risks of Accutane is a better way to maintain safety than taking two forms of contraception. Accutane can be safe without complicating lives. With more reasonable guidelines and lower doses, teenagers can treat acne without unnecessary obstacles.