In the Plastic Surgery world of Beverly Hills, skin care has always been a hot topic. I would like to explain my philosophy on skin care. My approach for people who have existing sun damage depends on the person’s desires.
I first try to ascertain if the person wants an aggressive or conservative approach. For those people who wish to have every little wrinkle removed I recommend an aggressive approach which consists of a Phenol peel or a CO2 laser. Both of these treatments will require general anesthesia and several weeks of healing time and can leave the skin red for up to several months (although makeup can be used for camouflage after 1 week). For those people who want improvements but do not want the downtime associated with the Phenol or CO2, I recommend the E-Matrix or Fractionated CO2 lasers which have both minimal downtime technologies. Because of this, a series of 3-5 treatments are recommended about a month apart. Both of these lasers will resurface and provide textural smoothing and improvement in sun damage. The treatments are done in the office with topical anesthesia. These lasers will improve the skin texture and tone and will correct many facial wrinkles but not to the extent of the Phenol peel or Co2 laser. Resurfacing procedures can be done at the same time as surgery or at a different time depending on each individual person.