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Article
December 1954

DERMABRASION OF THE ACNE PIT

Author Affiliations

NEW YORK

From the Department of Dermatology and Syphilology of the New York University Post-Graduate Medical School (Dr. Marion B. Sulzberger, Chairman) and the Skin and Cancer Unit of the University Hospital.

AMA Arch Derm Syphilol. 1954;70(6):754-766. doi:10.1001/archderm.1954.01540240060007
Abstract

HISTORY

PIT, SCAR, and blemish have since antiquity been the bane of patient and physician. The oldest medical document extant prescribed an abrasive "to make the face smooth" (Papyrus Ebers, 1,500 B. C.): Sig: Water from the qebu plant Meal of alabaster* Fresh Abt grain Mix in honey, make into a pap, mix in human milk and anoint the face therewith.

Thirty-four centuries later finds this prescription still in use with but minor changes (Unna, 1900 A. D.): Cremor gelanthi Sapon Pulv. pumicis*

* Note the similar abrasive materials.

In relatively recent times, the following methods have been advocated for the removal of pits, tattoos, scars, pigmentations (including chloasma), milia, ephelides, lentigines, nevi, verrucae, seborrheic keratoses, keloids, furuncles, wrinkles, rhinophyma, and "enlarged pores." Some workers have published the details of various methods; the work of others is known to us personally.

  1. Acupuncture (Needling) Variot (1888)—Tattoos (10% tannic acid followed

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