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Accutane is a member of the drug class known as retinoids, which have been demonstrated to affect the way the body reads genes. Use of the drug while pregnant is known to damage fetuses and reduce the amount of brain cells that they generate. This is why cautions are taken to ensure that female who are pregnant or who can become pregnant do not take the drug. However, recent studies suggest that brain-cell generation can be equally important in adolescents and adults. Researchers at the University of Baths and the University of Texas in Austin suggest Accutane can also interfere with the body's synthesis of the mood hormone serotonin.

While experience from the more than 13 million users of Accutane worldwide suggests that just 5 to 10 percent suffer from side effects, retinoids have also been implied in connections to Alzheimer's disease and schizophrenia, so specialists are eager to understand how the drug works.

Depression Linked to Acne Treatment

Acne treatment with the medication isotretinoin (Accutane) has been involved in an elevation in feelings of depression in adolescent users, and while the link has never been demonstrated, researchers have collected evidence through an animal study.

Although scientist Dr. Sarah Bailey knew that it is not possible to ask a mouse if it is depressed, its behaviour can be observed and modeled with two tests. The first includes causing the adolescent mice to experience stress by forcing it to swim, while the other one induces stress by suspending the mice by its tail.

Acne Cure Tested for Side Effects

Normally, a mouse will swim, climb or struggle, and only periodically stop in a period of resignation. A depressed mouse will stay in its resigned state longer than one that is healthy. The mice given human-equivalent doses of Accutane tended to show increased depression-related behavior.

Accutane maker Roche says, "While no causal relationship has been established between Accutane and either depression or suicide, we are permanently monitoring all available safety databases on Accutane worldwide." However, the World Health Organization has confirmed 720 cases of psychiatric problems associated to the use of Accutane, including 84 suicides and suicide attempts.

The allegation that isotretinoin promoted depression and suicide has won a few lawsuits, and is partially responsible for the strict control of the drug, especially in the US. Several case reports of depression, suicidal ideation, suicide attempt, and suicide in people treated with the acne skin care isotretinoin have been sent to the U.S. FDA Adverse Events Reporting System, with 431 cases documented between 1982 and May 2001 - of these 37 patients had committed suicide.

Idiosyncratic Effects From Acne Skin Care

Studies have demonstrated that people with acne, the population group eligible to receive isotretinoin treatment, have an elevated risk of clinical depression compared with the general population. Isotretinoin associated depression is "an idiosyncratic side effect." Usually anxiety can bring on acne and depression, leading to more anxiety. Also, treatment of severe acne using isotretinoin has been demonstrated to reduce anxiety and depression.

One experiment using positron emission tomography (PET) showed functional brain imaging changes in patients treated with isotretinoin, however the clinical relevance of this finding is unclear.