Laser Treatments Specialist

H/K/B Cosmetic Surgery

Board Certified Plastic Surgeon located in Mount Pleasant, SC

Perhaps the greatest revolution in aesthetic treatments has been through the harnessing of light energy for cosmetic effect. Lasers, pulsed light, and even radiofrequency waves are now tools at hand that create many cosmetic improvements without resorting to the scalpel and recovery times associated with surgical procedures. H/K/B in Charleston and Mount Pleasant, South Carolina can show you what new technology offers toward meeting your aesthetic goals. Call the office or book online today.

843-970-1842

Laser Treatments Q & A

How do cosmetic lasers and other new aesthetic technologies work?

While there are many specific treatments afforded by these technologies, one thing that most have in common is the ability to work on deeper layers of tissue without needing incisions or other breaches of your surface skin layers.

With lasers, the secret is a very narrow range of light. In fact, any laser system uses only a single wavelength of light. When you think of the full spectrum of the rainbow, a laser produces just a single point of colored light from across that entire spectrum. The specific color depends both on the type of laser and careful tuning, but this narrow wavelength means that only certain tissue absorbs the laser’s energy. The light can pass through surface skin as though it was transparent.

Other treatments use intense pulsed light of wider wavelengths to cover more skin pigment issues, and radiofrequency devices create similar results to lasers, transmitting energy using radio waves to penetrate beneath your skin’s surface. Each of these techniques work by warming deep skin tissue and jump-starting the body’s own regeneration systems.

How does the body regenerate itself when stimulated by cosmetic lasers?

The general effect of each of these aesthetic systems is that of warming, so that deep skin tissue reaches a temperature called the coagulation point. The body sees this tissue as damaged, and the healing systems respond by removing damaged tissue and replacing it with new growth. This is a process that is usually dormant until injury occurs.

The amount of warming to achieve coagulation is not particularly hot -- usually no more than 10 degrees Celsius above regular body temperature. This is enough to make existing tissue, such as collagen and elastin in your skin’s dermis layer, appear compromised to the body. As this damaged tissue leaves through the lymphatic system, many pigment issues, wrinkles, sun damage, and scars go too, supported and enhanced by the fresh, new tissue made in response.