Thursday, June 19, 2014

Making the nose look smaller with filler

                Before                         After
 
 
If your nose has a scooped out bridge or concavity on the dorsum, adding a little hyaluronic acid filler may give the appearance of a smaller nose.

Sunday, June 15, 2014

Gentle Laser vaginal tightening for help with urinary incontinence and/or sexual pleasure

Have you ever leaked in your pants after jumping up and down in a dance class or while jogging?  Would you like to improve your sexual pleasure for both you and your partner?

The gynecology literature states that trauma from pregnancy and aging changes both contribute to urinary incontinence and vaginal tissue laxity in many women.

Treatment of vaginal aging and pregnancy changes does not have to involve surgery.  I am excited that we now have the laser technology to safely and gently but effectively treat vaginal tissue and skin laxity and urinary incontinence with laser.

In my office in Utah, as laser skin and tissue treatment experts we offer treatment for vaginal tissue/skin laxity and urinary incontinence with our Fotona brand Erbium:Yag laser.  Treatments take just a half hour to 45 minutes, are usually pain-free, and need to be done 1-2 times for improvement and sometimes eradication of symptoms. Even with a history of bladder prolapse this treatment is helpful.  In fact, it is often because of tissue laxity that prolapse occurs, and tissue laxity is the target of this treatment.

The Fotona Erbium:Yag laser has a variety of settings so it can be used for a variety of medical or cosmetic treatments.   For vaginal tightening we are relying on lower energy and longer pulse durations of the laser, which translates to thermal heating of the tissue dermis in order to stimulate new collagen formation.  So it is essentially controlled heating at precisely the right depth to result in tissue rejuvenation.

This treatment has already swept Europe where there are long wait times to get in, but american gynecologists are thrilled with the technological advance and have been referring their patients for this exciting treatment.

Wednesday, June 4, 2014

Scar Treatments

Scar treatments keep advancing and improving.   The best treatment for your scar depends on whether the scar is thickened (hypertrophic) or thinned (atrophic) and/or discolored (pink or brown or full of blood vessels.) 

What is a keloid scar?  The term "keloid" seems to be one of the most misused words in dermatology.  A true keloid is a tumor-like growth of scar tissue that goes significantly beyond the original borders of the scar both in height and width.  True keloids are more common in darker skin types.  If a scar is just thickened but still roughly within the confines of the original wound or scar, then dermatologists prefer to call it a hypertrophic scar.

Hypertrophic scars and keloids are often treated with a steroid injection, or liquid nitrogen followed by a steroid injection.  There are some unusual, off-label (not FDA-approved) treatments for scars and keloids like 5-fluorouracil, bleomycin and interferon injections that are still considered safe by most dermatologists, especially because of the small quantities that are use for treatment.  In addition, fractionated lasers are often very helpful for both hypertrophic and atrophic scars.  All these treatments, including laser, need to be repeated multiple times for full benefit.  The number of treatments varies depending on the severity of the scar and the power of the laser.

Discolored scars can be improved with laser treatment.  For example, if the scar has redness or prominent vessels, an IPL device or pulsed-dye laser can help.  In addition, if the scar is brown, the IPL device, QS-alexandrite or fractionated 1927 nm lasers may help.