With how advanced the human body is, you would think we would have the ability to repair skin damage flawlessly. Unfortunately, this is not the case.

Darker Skin = Worse Scarring
I have very dark skin for being caucasian. Even the parts of my body that have never seen sun look tan when compared to average. Because my skin has more pigment, I scar easier. Generally speaking, this is the same for all ethnicities whereas darker skin equals a higher chance of scar tissue formation.

One of the most annoying things about this for me is that any little burn or cut I get stays with me forever. So not only do I have little nick, cut, burn, and scrape from childhood permanently preserved on my skin, but I also have tons of surgical scars from a car accident I was in… and they’re not pretty!

What causes scarring?
Well I am no doctor, but from what I understand, they are the result of overactive healing. Or in other words, our bodies going into overdrive while it’s repairing our skin. This is why scars often end up raised and bumpy – because your body is producing excess collagen and cells in the area that was injured.

Why are scars darker?
So if it wasn’t bad enough having our skin by lumpy from it, we also have to have discoloration. Initially it may be red, which will eventually darken over time and turn to brown. This process often takes anywhere from one year to a year and a half until it has fully “aged” to what it’s going to permanently look like.

What causes the excess pigment is too much blood flow to the area. This is part of the “overactive healing” where our bodies are pumping too much blood to the damaged area.

What causes keloid scarring?
This is something that unfortunately the medical community hasn’t been able to answer yet. However it appears there is a strong genetic component involved. The odd part is even if someone is prone to them, they may only develop keloids in one area (such as their ears) but not on other parts of their body.

What is hypertrophic scarring?
These are similar to keloids, the main difference being that that they don’t grow outside of the boundaries of the scar (keloids can grow and protrude out into a growth). Both of these types are the result of too much collagen production during the healing process. But again, the exact cause of each is not exactly known other than the suspected genetic culprit.

Best Scar Treatment?
Although it’s impossible to make them completely disappear, fortunately there are various techniques and products which can improve their appearance.

Personally, when it came to my surgical scars, I had the best results using a silicone scar sheet that I wore over the area for a couple months. It’s not known exactly how the silicone helps but no one doubts its effectiveness. There are also scar removal treatment creams that use silicone as a primary ingredient. The benefit of using it in the cream form is that they can combine it with other proven ingredients in order to maximize your results.