I want to get rid of acne scars, old age wrinkles and sun spots! Help!
Understanding Your Skin
[Take photos of your skin every 4 weeks without makeup or filters while you are undertaking your skin change challenges!]
One full cycle of skin takes about 6 weeks. When you are starting your skin care regimen, or getting laser energy based treatments patience is key. For a full improvement, I would expect to see 3 full cycles. This is assuming that you are continuing to use your skin are regimen. When you stop for weeks at a time, your skin has to readjust to the routine each time. Once you are on the road to happy, healthy and plump skin, you will find that it doesn’t take as much effort to maintain.
Adjuncts: Facials and chemical peels are nice additions to your skin restoration recovery journey.
Peels will help to tighten skin, reduce pores, and decrease sun spots.
Body peels or radio frequency skin tightening are excellent for reducing crepiness to the neck, arms, legs!
Facials are always fabulous!
Prevention
Sunblock is the most important step you can take to avoid “difficult to reverse and repair” damage to your skin. It is never to late to start, and it is never to early to encourage kids to use sunblock.
Neurotoxins such as Botox, Dysport, Xeomin and Daxxify soften the appearance of wrinkles. The dynamic stage of a wrinkle is when it is only present with muscle movement. The static phase of a wrinkle develops over time and with repeated movements. This wrinkle become “set” or etched into your skin. You may feel happy, but your etched line may make you appear upset. Starting neurotoxins before your lines are deep will help you to prevent static wrinkles. This is also important for men, since their midface/forehead furrows can create an angry look as they age.
Reversal and Restoration
Sun Damage: Redness, broken capillaries, brown spots and wrinkles. These can be reversed! No need to carry around the fun of your youth! Because individual needs many vary, seeing us in person ( or FaceTime) is the best place to begin. Some people will do very will with a prescription retin-A and brightening cream for reducing lines and sun spots. Some will benefit from IPL ( Intense Pulsed Light) which can help with sun spots and broken capillaries. If you have underlying melasma, you will benefit from prescription strength brightening creams and retin-a, along with strict use of sunblock. We can provide these to you, and we ship as well.
Expect that with restoration, it will take 6 weeks to see a significant change. It doesn’t mean that you won’t see changes sooner, but the skin takes time to turn over and reveal your healthier, glowing skin!
3. Lasers! (And energy based, non laser treatments)
Laser treatments can reverse sun damage by stimulating the skin's natural healing processes and promoting the growth of new, healthy skin cells.
The laser energy targets specific layers of skin tissue, causing them to heat up and tighten. This heat also triggers the production of collagen, a protein that helps to give skin its elasticity and tightness.
Over time, this increased collagen production leads to firmer, more youthful-looking skin.Additionally, the laser energy can penetrate deeply enough to break down pigmented areas that have accumulated from sun exposure.
We have found the RESURFX laser to be the best for only 1 day of social downtime and excellent results! This can be combined with IPL for the”PHOTOFRACTIONAL” which accelerates the treatments by attacking the dermis and superficial sun damage at the same time.
The body then naturally removes these pigmented areas, resulting in a brighter, more even skin tone.
There are various types of laser treatments that can be used for skin rejuvenation, including ablative lasers (which remove the top layer of skin) and non-ablative lasers (which heat up the deeper layers of skin without removing the top layer (RESURFX).
We have developed a treatment that encompasses all of the above options in one day! It is called TRIPLE THREAT, and it addresses the superficial sun damage, broken capillaries, ablative treatment with radiofrequency micro needling AND non ablative treatment via the dermal heating with the RESURFX. This is fantastic for acne scars, wrinkles and sun damage.
The specific type of laser used will depend on the extent of the sun damage and the desired outcome of the treatment.It's important to note that laser treatments are not a one-time solution, and multiple sessions may be needed to achieve the desired results.
4. Other concerns: Dark spots, underlie circles, dry skin and rosacea and acne! What is the cause? Have you tried everything and it’s still a problem?
These can be a bear to live with daily. I will address this in our next blog.
