r/Keloids

In my teen years and early 20’s I developed chest and shoulder keloids from acne (a lot). I’d say greatly improved overall and more importantly I learned how to prevent new keloids from forming.

I know how painful and embarrassing they can be to deal with. I went through years of trial and error of different methods. More than welcome to DM me and I can share more details and just try to help you with whatever you’re struggling with related to keloids.

Short story:

1. To prevent new keloids from forming from acne you have to keep the acne incredibly moisturized with lotion and then cover it with silicone and tape. If the acne is soft and the puss can be drained then do so, and the acne with subside and no scar will form. If you let the acne go and don’t address it, it hardens and turns into the keloid scar. I can go into detail just DM me.

2. For existing keloid scars Kenalog shots 40 mg/ml every few months, thick lotion application daily (I used Lubriderm advanced) and silicone sheets of 1 mm thickness or greater using hypoallergenic tape.

Summary: dermatologists don’t know shit. Request the highest concentration Kenalog which is 40 mg/ ml. They say only 10 or 20? Find a different dermatologist. THICK high quality silicone (1mm to 2 mm) with hypoallergenic tape and very thick moisturizing lotion. This is a multi year process but you can find success if you’re willing to be consistent.

These photos are about 3 years apart on the same side of my body (my other shoulder looks similar) and I'm wondering if anyone's had similar growth and what treatment has helped? In the years I've been offered steroid injections (with this many I think I'd collapse before they even did half), a topical ointment for the itching, and then Accutane (which I can't do).

In desperation, I turned to reddit for advice on how to deal with my chest keloids. Photo 1 was when it was at its worst before I got them injected. I've tried kenalog injections, scar tapes, Mederma, silicone gels - nothing worked. It seems reddit has been raving about the Eclar scar tape so I bought a pack which arrived pretty quickly considering I live in North America! Fingers crossed these keloids go away for good!

I am leaving the smallest one for now because it's too small and cutting pieces that small is gonna be a pain lol

The dreds hide it mostly but its bad and been getting worse for years

Hi guys! May I ask how do you make the keloid on your legs look unnoticeable when you are wearing a dress?

I am attending a dance party and we have been required to wear a skirt but I am not confident about wearing one because of my scar 🥲

Pic for reference. It's located about an inch under my knee and it's as big as a centavo 🥲

I have a keloid on my ear from an industrial piercing when I was 17. Its been growing very fast lately now and it causes me pain. The first pic is from August the second is from today. I have a referral to dermatology but im getting more and more worried about it. Should I go back to my gp about it? I keep it hidden most of the time so I didnt realise how bad it is. The referral could still be rejected but they have till end of June to decide.

I got rid of small keloids on my chest.

I followed the instructions in a reddit post from user home_on_whore_island.

She had a keloid on her chest, larger than the ones I had, and she followed a simple method, she put a hydrocolloid patch on it and left it there for a week, then changed it and kept putting patches on it for years.

The key is the pressure, constant pressure flatens the keloid.

Her results were pretty good so I though I could try it on my smaller keloids with COSRX pimple patches.

I started a year ago, changing the patches every two weeks or whenever they fell on their own, and now two of my 3 keloids are completely flat, almost the same color of my skin and not itchy nor with any signs of coming back!

The third keloid is older, I think that's why it's more persistent.

I'll search for pics to show the before and after. For now, here's an after Pic, the keloid used to be where that faint pink spot is. The spot is larger than the keloid but in real life its almost invisible, not itchy , not smooth like keloid skin, feels like regular skin.

Hope this helps!!!

- IF YOU GOT A FACE SCAR

- YOU'RE WILLING TO TRAVEL TO CALIFORNIA

- YOU'RE WILLING TO DO A VERTEPORFIN TRIAL

PLEASE E-MAIL HIS SECRETARY

WITH YOUR PICTURES:

INFO@QAZICLINIC.COM

OR THIS EMAIL:

CONTACT@QAZICLINIC.COM

PHONE NUMBER : +1949-336-7293

Hi everyone, I (25f) am looking for some advice regarding a scar on my chest from the removal of a moderately atypical dysplastic nevus. Prepare for a long post. I will preface this by saying I went to a plastic surgeon as my derm is an NP and couldn’t perform the removal. I never met the Dr. before the removal and his bedside manners are poor, although I continue to see him. I need advice to make sure I’m doing the right thing or if I need a second opinion. I will provide the timeline corresponding with each photo:

1. 12/30/25: Day of mole removal. I had about 10 stitches externally and 5 internal. Skip to 2. if you don’t care about medical jargon from my report: “3 mm margins are drawn circumferentially around the lesion so that the total excision measures 1.4 cm. Marking sutures are placed along the short axis. Extensive wide undermining is performed in a direction perpendicular and equal to 2.8 cm. Complex closure performed of 2.8 cm using 4-0 monocryl through Scarpa's and dermis and 4-0 nylon through skin.”

2&3. 1/6/26: My stitches were removed after one week per the Dr’s recommendation that I have them removed after 7-10 days. The nurse seemed surprised that I was getting them removed so early but my Dr said it looked fine and to remove them. Was 7 days too early? Picture is of after stitches removal with glue, and 5 days after when the scar looked its best.

4. 2/12/26: I started using silicone scar tape after the open wounds fully healed from the stitches removal. The skin around my scar was very sensitive, itchy, and overall super bothersome. I sent this photo to my Dr. who told me to come back in as it looked like the scar was either hypertrophic or early stages of a keloid. When I went back in he recommended cortisone shots. I had 10mg of kenalog injected into the scar (the most painful thing I have ever felt in my entire life!) and he recommended I continue to use paper tape instead of silicone tape on my scar. I have been using paper tape 24/7 since then. Picture is before shots.

5. At my 4 week follow up I got the shots again, this time with 5FU mixed with the kenalog at 5mg each. Again the most painful thing I ever felt in my life. Picture is of before the shot.

6&7. 6 week follow up. I had the same injections as last time and I tried to use lidocaine 1 hour beforehand to ease the pain, which didn’t help at all. Still the most painful thing I have ever felt, but I didn’t cry this time since I’m now conditioned to how badly it hurts. Pictures are before shot and afterwards.

8. Most recent picture taken 5/3. A lot of bruising this time. Upside of the shots is that the scar doesn’t bother me at all currently. 0 pain or discomfort currently.

I have another follow up for 6 weeks again and I am not sure if I should go. Is the pain worth it? My Dr. said sometimes people need 4 rounds of shots or sometimes up to a “year.” He also has not shown any empathy at all to how badly it hurts when he does the shots- as if he doesn’t believe me. I’m leaning towards not going anymore. Based on google research I believe? he is doing the most research-based treatment but I just don’t know if it’s worth it. I’m hoping this last round will make a difference after the bruising subsides.

If you got this far thank you! Looking for any advice or camaraderie. I wasn’t sure if I should post this in r/dermatologyquestions instead bc there’s more traffic in there but thought I would reach out to my scar people first :)

Surgery is way too expensive,Eclar plasters too, only viable options are kenalog and 5fu, my keloid is way too bulky, and i have decided to devote to shots. Alone ,
Damn i hate this life

I had a keloid on the back of my forward helix which was big and went on the back plane of my ear. In July 2025 I had it excised, followed by 1 round of SRT the day after. No follow ups to my derm since, the doctor was good but the practice overall didn't give much information on follow ups or signs to look out for to signal regrowth. Every time I visited it was a different doctor who didn't give much information or check anything.

I'm 10 months post op and at first I felt really confident that my keloid was no more. However the last couple weeks I've been getting that zapping feeling and some throbbing. I'm now worried that it's coming back.

I have compression magnet "earrings" that I try to wear but it's such a weird location (the fold of my forward helix) that I can't really cover the entire scar area.

Can anyone tell me if it sounds like this keloid is coming back? I don't have them anywhere else on my body and scar pretty well. This keloid was from a vad industrial piercing.

Should I try to get steroid shots asap? Or any suggestions on what I can do to make sure it doesn't grow back? First pic is the keloid, followed by post op. Last pics are from a month ago.

ive had a keloid scar for about a year and a half now. from august-december 2025 i got steroid treatment after gels and creams didnt help with the significant sharp pain i had been experiencing.

pain left until april

i saw a doctor last week and he recommended i start again (as gel, tape, cream, etc weren't helping).

i got the injections today. he was waaayy better than the person before him. he was actually careful rather than just stabbing me and injecting me anywhere.

with the doctor before him, the steroids were injected very unevenly. the top half was flatter than the bottom and one particular area (now blue) had a white line on it. the skin around it was a light purple and you could see red veins very distinctly (cant believe i paid $500 for that). the bottom is where my pain is coming from because the lady never got to the bottom and was too concerned about my pain and just rushed it. so as it didnt really get a lot of steroids, now im realising why the pain has come back.

i didnt have an opportunity to tell my new doctor this and i couldnt stop him from injecting into the purple area (the white has now faded). i thought he'd had noticed and probably wouldnt have injected if it was important for him not to. but now its literally blue.. and im scared.

is this... okay?

Hi everyone,
I’ve had this keloid on my upper arm/shoulder for a while now (photo attached). It started from a small bump/injury and turned into a raised scar. It’s firm, quite noticeable, and I feel like it may have grown slightly over time.
I’ve already tried steroid injections, but honestly they were really painful, and I’m not sure I can keep doing them regularly.
I’ve also recently ordered Eclar plaster (steroid tape) — has anyone used this? Does it actually help flatten keloids like this?
I wanted to ask:
Has anyone had success treating a keloid without injections?
Do silicone sheets or gels work at this stage?
Any less painful treatments that worked for you (laser, freezing, etc.)?
If you continued injections, did it get easier over time or was it always this painful?
I’m trying to find something effective but also manageable long-term. Also a bit worried about making it worse since I’ve read keloids can come back bigger after certain treatments.
Would really appreciate real experiences — especially alternatives to injections or thoughts on Eclar plaster.
Thanks!

Im gonna have one small removed and injected with veteporfin to test how it will affect keloids on humans

Hi all. I thought I'd share my keloid progression so far... it's nothing crazy. But it helps me to see that something IS happening, when I think it isn't because progress is so slow.

Basically The bottom image is what my keloids looked like prior to getting injections, monthly for about a year. I stopped once I felt it was flat enough and stopped itching. I have one on my arm, and basically 1 on my chest (there used to be a small one next to it, that surprisingly took only 1 injection to fix... that one might be more like a hypertrophic scar though?).

After 3 years, some areas started to raise up again, so I looked into trying Eclar plaster. It's been about 8 months since I've used it, and I'm pretty happy with the results, though it seems slow. I've been pretty inconsistent with it... some days I change it daily, sometimes I give my skin a break for a days or even weeks.

I've honestly forgotten how it looked before, until I made this. So, I am pretty happy with the change... even if it doesn't change much from here.

About last year I went through really bad chest acne and took accutane to help ease it out.

I started in June of 2025 and finished around December 2025.
It was brutal and I was left with these keloid scars all over.

The treatments I’ve done so far my dermatologist has been injecting kenalog shots mostly in just the bigger ones. And I’ve been wearing silicone sheets around the major ones on my chest

Jan 30th- received kenalog-10 on bigger main ones
March 18th- received kenalog-10 on more of them
April-20th. Received kenalog 20 on more spreaded out ones.
Next appointment will be May 21st.

I have not done any treatments cosmetic wise such as lasering and am focusing on the flatness first.

Has anyone went through similar to what I have and have any positive outcomes? These scars suck and it makes me depressed. I hope to be able to take off my shirt again.

Anyone have any other recommendations on treatments I can try out?

And no I have not taken steroids and I don’t even work out

After pimple on chest. Been 5 years. Would silicon gel help?