Rosacea

Laser skin resurfacing treatments help reduce acne scars, wrinkles and the effects of sun damage on almost any skin type. They are a popular treatment choice in skin rejuvenation and the SmartXide Dot Therapy is a more advanced technique of skin rejuvenation that treats one area of skin at a time. SmartXide Dot Therapy is a fractional resurfacing treatment that will cause fewer side effects and presents fewer risks than traditional CO2 laser treatments. The SmartXide DOT Therapy system utilizes a ‘dot’ pattern to create thousands of microscopic perforations in the skin and leaves the areas around each ‘dot’ intact. The procedure is versatile, as it may reduce wrinkling, age spots, scars or acne; at the same time, the CO2 laser beams will tighten the skin by stimulating the formation of collagen. A single treatment of SmartXide Dot Therapy can visibly rejuvenate the skin. The recovery time after SmartXide Dot Therapy depends on how deep/strong the treatment settings were. In general recovery time takes anywhere between 2 to 5 days, which is minimal compared to the 6 months recovery time required by the traditional CO2 treatments.

People living in the Pacific Northwest tend to forget that the summer sun can still have a damaging effect on the skin especially when during the rest of the year we live in an overcast rainy weather that causes our skin to be more photosensitive. The summer of 2009 we had here in Seattle was a prime example of an unforgiving hot summer. The face is a very important part of our everyday appearance and is the most exposed, so it is very important to keep it looking young and healthy. If we forget to wear adequate sun protection we will most likely end up with sun spots, wrinkles and lines or red complexion which will make the faces look older.

A new and effective skin treatment technique called IPL FotoFacial combines intense pulsed light (IPL) with bi-polar radio frequency to provide non-ablative treatment for any of the mentioned skin conditions above. Using IPL FotoFacial does not damage the surface of the skin, and uses high intensity pulses of broadband light different from the narrow band light of lasers. IPL FotoFacial does not damage the surface of the skin as it works on the deeper dermal layer. This means that there is no recovery time after undergoing this treatment that takes between 30-45 minutes on average. IPL FotoFacial treatments are progressive in nature and hence multiple sessions spread 3 to 4 weeks apart are recommended. The end result is radiant skin improved with tone and texture.

A common misconception about IPL FotoFacial treatments is the assumption that they fix scarring. For acne scarring and other deeper wrinkles lasers such as Erbium Yag and Diode can be used for skin resurfacing as well as skin tightening. The one thing to remember with IPL FotoFacial is that it is safest and works best with skin types 1 through 4. So IPL FotoFacial produces great results for Caucasian, Middle Eastern Olive, and Asian Skin. It is however inadvisable to use IPL FotoFacial on darker East Indian or African American skin due to the pigment in the skin and the risk of burning and scarring.

Katy Issa
Clinic Manager