Tattoo Removal

There are a lot of different ways to remove tattoos but they all cause scarring except for one. Only laser tattoo removal will remove a tattoo without a scar and give you a cosmetically superior result. In order to understand why all of the other techniques cause scarring, you really need to understand what a tattoo is. When people get a tattoo, they get lots of injections of colored ink and in that ink, are colored pigment particles. Those particles are pushed through the upper layer of the skin, which is called the epidermis, into the top of the dermis where scavenger cells eat or ingest that pigment, and those cells live there forever, so they keep the colored particles forever and that’s why the tattoos last so long or almost forever. All the other techniques other than lasers need to actually get to the pigment particles, either by cutting them out or scraping them out and, in doing so, you’ve got to break through the upper layer of the skin, the epidermis, and, in so doing, that’s why you get scars. The reason that lasers work their magic is that when the laser energy passes through the epidermis, it doesn’t do any damage, and also the laser energy is very targeted just for the color pigment of the tattoo so it only damages that color pigment, it doesn’t damage any of the surrounding skin.

When people are treated for tattoos, it can take 8-12 treatments for a professional tattoo or 3-4 treatments for an amateur tattoo. But because the treatments are two months apart, it can take up to two years for a professional tattoo. Sometimes there’s some discomfort, so local anesthesia is used to make the procedure more comfortable. It takes a week or two after the treatment for the skin to heal, and usually you just need to use an antibiotic ointment and a Band-Aid. The treatments are done two months apart to allow the previous treatment to have the maximum effect so you can have the minimum number of treatments.

Different color tattoos have different issues associated with them. Black tattoos and red tattoos are the easiest for the lasers to remove. Yellow and pale green ones are the toughest for the lasers to remove and white pigment is very tricky because sometimes it turns black from the laser energy and that black is then impossible for even a laser to get rid of.

So remember, if you’re getting tired of your tattoo or, more importantly, if your significant other has told you that you’re getting tired of your tattoo, they can be removed with a cosmetically superior result with lasers.