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[music] Hello, I’m Dr. Neal Schultz
[pause]
and welcome to DermTV.
Today I’m going to tell you something about new tattoos that I’ll bet you
didn’t know. More and more people are getting new tattoo’s and for all
sorts of good reasons. But I’ll bet that one of those reasons is people
have realized that if they don’t like their tattoo or they want to remove
their tattoo it can be done easily, safely and without scarring by laser
treatments. I’m going to let you use your imagination as to what the
reasons are that people finally do decide to change or remove a tattoo, it
can be the wrong color, it can be in the wrong place, maybe they’re just
not happy with it anymore or maybe it’s a result of having had a few beers
one night and then waking up the next morning and realizing maybe that
wasn’t such a good idea and lastly, it just may be the wrong name. But what
most people don’t understand about laser tattoo removal is that in order
for the laser to work that tattoo has to set, has to be there for about two
months. Let me explain why. When a tattoo is put in, ink is injected into
the skin with particles and these particles have a color. They’re
relatively large particles in terms of the scale of the skin. These large
particles are much too big for the body to get rid of so they stay there.
It’s sort of like if I were to try to take the large bookcase behind me out
through a window- it just wouldn’t fit. Lasers work by actually pulverizing
those larger particles into tiny, tiny little particles and those little
particles can then easily be taken away by the body and then the tattoo
disappears. But here’s the catch, it takes about two months for those new
large particles to be acted on by cells and absorbed into the large cells
that ultimately pulverizing will allow the body to remove. So the bottom
line is, before you get your next tattoo, make sure it’s the right color,
the right shape and the right tattoo because once you get that tattoo
whether you like it or not you’re going to have to wear it for two months.