NEW ORLEANS — If you're looking for a quick way to help skin damage anywhere on your body, there's a treatment that may be the fix.
There's a device that doctors say you can use in the office, with no down time and no pain. It's even helping with old pregnancy stretch marks.
The procedure is called Secret RF, and it's already helped people like Gia Blanchard. At just 4'10" tall, Blanchard's baby bump was big.
"I had an 8 lbs, 5 oz. baby. I got these horrible stretch marks where it tore my skin apart," said Blanchard, 50.
So she turned to board-certified dermatologist Dr. Kate Zibilich Holcomb at Pure Dermatology in Metairie for help. Gia had already noticed that a procedure called Secret RF, was making a big difference on her face, neck and hands after a few treatments. So she decided to try it on her abdomen.
"I was never able to get rid of them and then, until we tried this, and it's been miraculous," Blanchard said.
"We're just basically putting two different procedures together to get one sort of rock star procedure," said Dr. Holcomb who is in private practice and is also a Tulane Assistant Clinical Professor.
Secret RF is one of the brands of combination microneedling and radio frequency. It's been around for years, but Dr. Holcomb says the machines now are more perfected. The action of the tiny needles alone going in and out of the skin promotes healing, and then the heat that the radio frequency generates under the skin, helps with tightening. It is not uncomfortable and requires no down time.
"Really where I think it wins, is texture. So you know the tiny little wrinkles that you can't Botox them, you can't really fill them. It's hard to get close to the eye with your using a laser, this is where this really does shine," Dr. Holcomb explained.
She says it can be used in all areas of the body on all skin types and tones. Men especially like it because it produces a natural healing. It even helps with sagging around the knees, large pores and acne scars.
Five years ago, Gia had to be rushed to the E.R. from the Endymion parade, when the medallion on a bead sliced her forehead open. Secret RF finally helped fade the telltale scar.
"You have to get very close and each treatment it gets lighter," Blanchard said about trying to find the scar. "I can tell a difference. My complexion, the texture of them, the spots, a lot of the spots have gone."
And she says even her OB-GYN noticed her pregnancy stretch marks are fading.
The cost for one treatment on the face is around $625-$700. If you treat the face and neck it is around $950.
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