Keeping the Holiday Weight Off
The holiday season is quickly approaching with Thanksgiving preparations and holiday gift shopping. While this season is typically focused on giving to others, don’t let yourself and your goals fall by the wayside. If you have wanted to get rid of unwanted fat, tone your muscles, or simply shape up before the holiday card photos are taken, SkinDC has the right treatments for you!
CoolSculpting
What is CoolSculpting?
CoolSculpting is a fat-freezing technology offering long-term results that will make your ‘trouble spots’ much less troubling. CoolSculpting uses cool temperatures to selectively target fat cells in your body. The cold temperatures signal your fat cells to enter apoptosis, also known as irreversible cell death. These dead fat cells get eaten up by macrophages, which are your body’s cleanup cells, and are ultimately excreted by your lymphatic system. Your body will naturally eliminate the dead cells for two to six months, sometimes more, resulting in up to 20-25 percent reduction of fat in the treated area. The fat cells are not regenerated over time so CoolSculpting is a permanent reduction of fat cells. As we leave adolescence and enter adulthood, we have a fixed number of fat cells. This means that we do not continue to produce more fat cells during our lifetime.
What Areas Can I Treat?
The CoolSculpting treatment is FDA-cleared for the treatment of visible unwanted fat bulges in the submental (under the chin) and submandibular (under the jawline) areas, inner thighs, outer tights, above the knee, abdomen, and flank, which includes bra fat, back fat, underneath the buttocks, and the upper arms. Not everyone is eligible for treatment in all areas, but with a consultation with our Body Contouring Specialist,Ragan Lake, she can draw out a treatment plan that is individualized and customized for your body.
What Should I Expect During the Treatment?
CoolSculpting is a completely non-invasive treatment for unwanted fat. This means that you can drive yourself to and from the treatment, resume all of your normal activities, and you can even work out on the same day. While the treatment is non-invasive, it can be uncomfortable at times. The first ten minutes of treatment can feel as though an ice pack has been left on your skin. After about ten minutes, the area being treated typically goes numb and the cold feeling subsides. Once the applicator has been removed, the provider will perform a brief two-minute massage on the treated area to break up the frozen fat cells and enhance the fat reduction.
What is the Timeline of This Treatment?
After you have received the treatment, the earliest you will notice changes is four to six weeks. Eight weeks is the typical time that a patient will notice a change from the treatment, with three months or twelve weeks being the point when our providers will evaluate the results of the treatment. At SkinDC, we typically recommend patients get at least two rounds of CoolSculpting to their desired treatment area. Schedulea FREE CoolSculpting Consultation today to get a customized treatment plan for your body goals.
To learn more about CoolSculpting, listen to our Body Contouring Specialist, Ragan Lake, talk about the treatment here:CoolSculpting at SkinDC
CoolTone
What is CoolTone?
CoolTone is an amazing way to strengthen and tone your muscles. CoolTone uses Magnetic Muscle Stimulation or MMS technology to penetrate through the skin and fat layers to target only the muscle layer. MMS induces involuntary muscle contractions. The body’s response to these contractions is to strengthen its muscle fibers, resulting in improved muscle conditioning. After the treatment(s), the treated area is firmer and has a more defined and toned appearance. One 30-minute CoolTone treatment is equivalent to completing 30,000 sit-ups. Not only will CoolTone help you reach your body’s aesthetic goals, but it will also help improve your physical strength. Your workouts will be more efficient and patients will find their previous workouts less difficult.
What Areas Can I Treat?
The CoolTone treatment is FDA-cleared for the abdomen, buttocks, and thighs. The ideal candidate for CoolTone are patients who wish to improve muscle tone and the firmness of their abdomen, buttocks, and/or thighs and do not have a contraindication to the CoolTone treatment. To find out if you are a good candidate and get a customized CoolTone treatment plan, schedule a consultation with our Body Contouring Specialist, Ragan Lake.
What Should I Expect During the Treatment?
During the treatment, one to two applicators will be placed on the patient’s treatment area. Throughout the treatment, the provider will slowly increase the intensity of the magnetic muscle stimulation, ensuring that the patient is never too uncomfortable with the intensity level. One great thing about CoolTone is that it has a built-in mechanism that will tap the patient’s treatment area after each contraction. This tapping allows for the breakup of lactic acid and therefore decreases the patient’s discomfort in the days following their CoolTone treatment session.
What is the Timeline of this Treatment?
At SkinDC we use a pretty aggressive initial plan with our patients to give them the best results. We like to see our patients nine times over the course of around three weeks. There is a minimum wait time of 24 hours between treatments. You can wear gym clothes to your treatment and walk out immediately after, with little to no downtime. You may have some soreness the day or two after receiving the treatment, but typically this feels as though you have just completed a workout at the gym. The progression of CoolTone results is fast and by the end of the initial treatment package, patients see, on average, a 30 percent improvement. Unlike with CoolSculpting, there is a maintenance component to CoolTone. At SkinDC, we recommend our patients schedule a single maintenance CoolTone treatment every one to two months after their initial treatment package. Schedulea FREE CoolTone Consultation today to get a customized treatment plan for your body goals.
To learn more about CoolSculpting, listen to our Body Contouring Specialist, Ragan Lake, talk about the treatment here:CoolTone at SkinDC
Kybella
What is Kybella?
Kybella is the only FDA-approved injectable treatment that destroys fat cells in the treatment area, under the chin, to improve your profile and get rid of unwanted fat. Kybella’s active ingredient, deoxycholic acid, is a naturally occurring molecule in the body that aids the breakdown and elimination of dietary fat in the digestive system. When injected into the fat layer beneath the chin, Kybella causes the fat cells to die. Once these fat cells are naturally removed by the body, they are permanently gone.
Is There Any Downtime?
Following a Kybella injection treatment, the treated area will be swollen for three to four days. There is a risk of developing a bruise at the injection site as well. The submentum, or double chin, will have the most significant and noticeable swelling. For most patients the recovery time from swelling and bruising commonly lasts several days with the first treatment. However, the severity of the side effects typically decreases with subsequent Kybella treatments.
What is the Treatment Timeline?
Patients will have an initial consultation with one of our providers to receive a customized Kybella treatment plan. You can schedulea cosmetic consultation at SkinDC to get started on your Kybella journey today! At SkinDC, we see that most patients will need three to six treatments to receive their desired results. Re-treatment of the desired area is completed every two months. You will see the full benefit of the treatment around four to six weeks after the last treatment in a series of three or more treatments.
To learn more about Kybella, listen to SkinDC’s co-founder and Board-Certified Dermatologist, Dr. Lina Naga, talk about the treatment here: Kybella Treatment at SkinDC