Could you be misdiagnosing yourself with acne too? (Picture: Shutterstock / Miroslav Lukic)

Perioral Dermatitis is a common skin complaint that might look a lot like acne, but it's quite a different beast to tackle.

A TikTok user who posts under the name Kateelayne thought she had acne for three years. She tried different treatments, but it kept coming back. 

Turns out that her diagnosis of acne was completely wrong. 

‘I’ve had acne since I was 21. I thought it was hormonal acne’, Kate said in the video, ‘Then last year it got especially bad.’

She booked an appointment with a dermatologist, ready to ‘try anything’. 

‘I was over it. He looks for one second, and he says "you need antibiotics for one month. You have Perioral Dermatitis, and then your skin will be clear."

‘I have been dealing with this for years…now one month, and it’s gone?’

Kate shared an update a few weeks later. The antibiotics didn’t work as planned; it wasn’t a miracle cure in one month, but it had got better. 

What is Perioal Dermatitis? 

It’s easy to mistake Perioral Dermatitis for acne, but the two are very different.