This New Age Light Is Making Heads Turn

The quest to own and to keep a youthful glow is never-ending. So even celebrities such as Kim Kardashian and Christie Brinkley have stuck to their diet of regular skin rejuvenation lasers. Speaking of lasers, red, swollen and burnt faces come to mind. But thanks to technology, good and effective treatments today do not necessarily need to have downtime. In fact, photo facials are all the rave now and the regular facial patron is looking for more than just comforting spa facial treatments – she wants the usual deep cleansing but is willing to trade a mild degree of discomfort (but not downtime) for some clinical skin benefits, depending on her skin needs.

 

BROADBAND LIGHT (BBL) IS NOW THE MUST-TRY LIGHT-BASED DEVICE

Specifically, such facials are called photo facials, because rather than using lasers, light-based devices are used to brighten the skin and to address specific skin concerns, without any downtime. And contrary to chemical peels and microdermabrasion, BBL penetrates deeper into skin to target a variety of skin problems, such as melasma, freckles, age spots, wrinkles and even redness and inflammation such as rosacea and acne.

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THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE SCITON BBL AND IPL

Not to be confused with Intense Pulsed Light (IPL), BBL is the newer, safer and therefore better version of light-based skin rejuvenation. In fact, the Sciton Forever Young BBL system has features which make the treatment more comfortable but also safeguards against burns and issues such as hyperpigmentation. For starters, it has a large treatment contact cooling sapphire crystal which allows a larger area to be treated, and the repetition rate is faster, allowing for gentler settings over multiple passes instead of single, higher and more dangerous ones.

 

The Sciton BBL comes with Smart filters for different skin types and also taps into the wide spectrum of light for different concerns. For example, 420nm emits blue light, which has been shown to be beneficial for getting rid of acne-causing bacteria.

 

Perhaps the most interesting module is the use of infrared light energy for bulk heating of the skin, leading to production of new dermal collagen and an overall skin tightening effect. In fact, there is published evidence showing that regular BBL treatments have enhanced the expression of youth-related genes in aged cells i.e. The BBL essentially reverses the ageing process by genetically returning the skin back to a youthful state!

Seeing is believing for this one. The Sciton BBL treatment has been shown to reverse ageing, genetically within cells. Left shows a patient before treatment at the age of 43, and right shows the same patient at the age of 55, after 9 years of BBL treatment regimen. [Images from www.sciton.com]

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1+1= 3 – FOREVER YOUNG BBL WORKS WELL WITH OTHER TREATMENTS

This will certainly interest the skin-obsessed, such as me. New research has further shown that use of topical antioxidants (with a treatment such as the Aqua.dermabrasion or Hydrafacial) with a BBL treatment regimen has been shown to improve the texture of the skin (such as pore size, pigmentation, dullness and roughness) as opposed to BBL treatments alone.

 

SW1 Clinic’s Full Bloom Program consists of 6 sessions of combined Aqua.dermabrasion which exfoliates and infuses topical antioxidants back into your skin at the same time, and BBL treatment, followed by their oxygen intensive treatment Oxyshot Intensive, so you can expect more than just a skin brightening treatment in their good hands, without any downtime.

 

Find out more about BBL and Full Bloom here.

 

By Megan Thomas

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