One of our patients came in with regrets about the freckles she had tattooed on her face. The tattoo artist had used black ink instead of brown, making the freckles look very unnatural and dark, especially for a fair-skinned blonde (whose natural freckles would likely be much more reddish-brown).
We used our PiQo4 picosecond laser for her first couple of tattoo removal treatments. This laser is the world’s highest-powered cosmetic laser, and because it is both that intense and because it delivers the laser in pulses of a trillionth of a second (picosecond), it’s able to safely deliver a lot more energy into the ink than previous lasers, for much more efficient treatments.
As you can see from the video, even after just a couple of treatments it’s clear how much the ink had faded. At this point in her treatment process, she was still covering the tattoos with concealer every day – something that no one enjoys. Today, she’s completely freckle-free and loving it!
Tattoo Removal is a Process – No Matter What Tattoo It Is or Who Removes It
Laser tattoo removal requires multiple treatments – with exceedingly rare exceptions (we’re talking 1 out of the thousands of patients we’ve treated – and we haven’t ever heard of anyone else, so maybe 1 in a million). The reason it requires multiple treatments is that the ink particles are blasted from larger particles into smaller particles with each session – and if they were already close to the end of that process (very fine particles), they wouldn’t be very visible in your skin.
Don’t be fooled by online scams like the Neatcell Picosecond Pen (an at-home laser claiming to create picosecond pulses) or NSWD Spot Removal (an LED picosecond device that claims to remove tattoos and freckles and other dark spots). No at-home device is going to be able to deliver anywhere near the energy levels the picosecond laser doctors use can, for 2 reasons: 1. These high-powered devices are highly regulated by the government because they can be very dangerous, and 2. Your house isn’t wired to produce enough electricity through the power outlets to get close to what these lasers produce (check out our wall plugs next time you’re in our office and you’ll notice all of our lasers use different, round plugs – those were specially wired up by an electrician, and when we got the PiQo4, we had to wire up even higher output plugs – that’s why we can’t move that laser to different rooms, it only has 1 plug in each office! – and our energy bill is crazy expensive when we use that laser a lot – being the world’s highest-powered laser available for cosmetic use is a very big deal). LEDs and at-home pens cannot come close to the strength and intensity of the lasers we use – and they never will – the PiQo4 laser can literally shoot holes in wood flooring or burn holes into your skin if used incorrectly- the government isn’t going to let just anyone have that kind of potentially dangerous equipment for sale on Amazon.
The best laser tattoo removal clinics have multiple lasers for treating tattoos – because each wavelength of laser light can only target 1 color in the spectrum best – and most lasers only create 1 to 3 wavelengths – and there are a lot more colors in the rainbow, right? Some places do try to do it all with just 1 laser – and what happens is they use that laser for things it’s really not great at – maybe it’s good at reds, and it can do oranges but takes twice as many sessions as alternating between a red and yellow wavelength laser at each session would. If you want fast, cost-effective results and complete removal of your tattoo (including all of the dark spots), you want to go somewhere that has lots of different lasers and does a lot of tattoo removal – and preferably has photos of patients similar to you (colors of ink, skin tone, type of tattoo) to prove their skills.
Permanent Makeup Tattoos Are More Complex & Tricky to Remove Than Other Types of Tattoos
Because Different Inks & Tattoo Placement Techniques are Often Used
Dr. Chasin is a specialist not only in tattoo removal but in the removal of permanent makeup. Tattooed freckles have become more and more popular (and unfortunately, they are often not exactly what the person was hoping for), and so this isn’t the first set of freckles tattoos we’ve removed (just the first person brave enough to share their story on social media and the internet). We hope you’ll take her advice and consider the color of the tattooed freckles you choose (black won’t look natural, but luckily black is much easier to remove than some other ink colors).
The reddish-brown color that actually would have made these freckles look more natural is a common color of ink used in eyebrow tattoos and microblading – and unfortunately, the chemicals mixed to make that color for permanent makeup can be very very problematic, because they often contain iron – and when the iron is hit by the laser, it just heats up, creates bad reactions, and often scars into place and sometimes even turns dark black. A scarred-in tattoo is at least 10x harder to remove because before you can get to the ink particles to break them up, you’ve got to first break up the scar tissue in your way (usually using a different type of laser). It’s a frustrating, expensive, and difficult process – and there are no guarantees that you’ll ever be able to get it all out with a perfect result. For that reason, it’s really important you not just see someone who does a lot of tattoo removals, but someone who does a lot of permanent makeup tattoo removals. Dr. Chasin is the doctor at our practice who handles the majority of these cases – and you want to see a doctor who, like him, sees the complicated, rare, difficult tattoo cases, in order to be sure of their ability to do the right thing in treating yours.
Schedule Your Free Consultation with One of Our Cosmetic Doctors Who Specialize in Tattoo Removal
If you’re curious about whether tattoo removal will work for you, how much money you could expect to spend on your treatments, and how many sessions or how long the whole process will be for you, we really recommend a free consultation with one of our doctors. For tattoo removal, this can be done in person at either of our New Jersey locations or virtually through a secure video chat appointment with the doctor.
