Active FX fractional CO2 treatment

I also just acquired the Active Fx laser from Lumenis.

This will be absolutely great for the practice. The Active Fx is a fractional CO2 laser - the only one that is currently in use. CO2 is the gold standard for laser skin resurfacing because it is so effective at erasing wrinkles and tightening skin. I don't like the technology because it is often too pwerful - causing weeks of downtime and red weeping skin. Although the face is much smoother after the resurfacing, the CO2 gives the skin a weird, waxy appearance that I really do not like.

The great thing about the Active Fx is that it uses CO2 technology, but instead of giving out a solid beam and destroying all the skin down to a certain layer, it puts out a bunch of little beams. The undamaged skin around the beams helps with quicker healing, and the beams can go deeper into the skin, doing a better job of stimulating collagen growth.

I've used the device on several people so far, and they have all been absolutely ecstatic with the results. One of these people is my nurse Natalie. I treated her entire face, including the under eye areas and around the lips. After that one treatment her skin tightened, her pores shrunk down dramatically and, most importantly, the lines around her eyes and mouth decreased significantly. This last result is the most exciting, since those are the most difficult areas to treat with a laser. I have not had good results with Fraxel, or any laser in those areas. In fact, Natalie had another nurse laser around her eyes with the Fraxel a while ago on really high settings. She was red and swollen for a week, and then her lines came back, just as noticeable as before.

Now, I am pleased to hear patients commenting on how she looks so much better and her skin is so much more supple. She was a bit swollen for 3 days and sunburn red for a week after the procedure - a mild discomfort comparable to the Fraxel. The results of one treatment, however, are much more dramatic for lines and pores than the Fraxel could ever do, even in 3 treatments.

We will get the laser by mid to late December, but we will have a few days when we do procedures on a loner unit from the company before then.