Understanding Laser Tattoo Removal

Laser Tattoo Removal is a revolutionary process that uses laser pulses to break up the ink molecules of a tattoo without disturbing the primary layers of the skin. Though laser technology has been around since 1958, using lasers in a medical procedure has been a recent development to come about in the last fifteen years. Today laser tattoo removal is the preferred medical technique by both patients and practitioners for the removal of tattoos.

To understand why laser tattoo removal has made such an important contribution to the field one must put it into context. Before laser tattoo removal most procedures that were used to get rid of that ‘fiery dragon’ or ex-girlfriend’s name’ that was so prominently displayed on a patient’s body dealt only with the epidermis, or primary skin layer. Techniques, like excision, would actually remove the area of the skin containing the tattoo with a scalpel and close up the wound with stitches leaving it prone to infection. Even more drastic, procedures like dermabrasion, simply ‘scrape’ away the epidermal layer of the skin until the tattoo can no longer be seen.

Unfortunately, tattoos aren’t technically even on the epidermis level. (The reason tattoos are so painful is because they are drawn into the dermis layer, or secondary layer of the skin.) Here the tattoo stays because the ink molecules are larger than the neighboring blood cells and therefore do not get carried away into the body.

What laser tattoo removal does so remarkably is break up the ink molecules into smaller pieces so that they can be carried away into the bloodstream. Practitioners of laser tattoo removal do this by using specific lasers to break up the pigment of specific colors in the tattoo on the dermis layer. The number of treatments needed is determined by many factors including the size, color, and type (professional or amateur) of the tattoo, but this laser process can take from 6-36 months-- with one month or so in between each treatment.

Though this may seem like a long time to see completion of tattoo removal, the results are often highly effective. Unlike older tattoo removal methods where scarring and infection were quite commonplace, these side effects are almost non-existent in laser tattoo removal due to its reliance on laser technology instead of a scalpel. Perhaps best of all laser tattoo removal looks far better than their medical counterparts; which, when you think about it, is the reason you get a tattoo removed in the first place. If you’d like to learn more about a New Jersey laser tattoo removal procedure contact Pistone Cosmetic Dermatology Associates for a free and private consultation.