Our Atlanta winters aren’t exactly on the level of Buffalo or Butte, which makes this the perfect time to at least put your unwanted fat under a winter chill with CoolSculpting®. Most people have heard of CoolSculpting® — it’s the world’s most popular non-invasive method of fat removal. One CoolSculpting® session removes 20-25 percent of the fat in the treatment area, without any incisions or recovery time. How cool, excuse the pun, is that?
At Beaty Facial Plastic Surgery, we’re big fans of CoolSculpting®. Dr. Beaty is actually a member of the Zeltiq/Allergan advisory board for CoolSculpting®. He has more experience and expertise with CoolSculpting® than anyone in the area.
Wintertime is a great time to come see us for CoolSculpting because it takes some time for your body to get rid of the fat cells destroyed by the system’s freezing technology. That means come spring and pool and beach season you’ll be slimmer and more contoured.
To that end, let’s get into CoolSculpting in the last two blogs of this oddest of years. Let’s call it CoolSculpting® 101.
What is CoolSculpting®?
CoolSculpting® and liposuction both have the same bad intentions when it comes to unwanted pockets of fat — they want to make that fat sleep with the fishes, so to speak. This is fat in areas that just doesn’t respond to changes in diet or exercise. The abdomen is the poster child for these pockets of unwanted fat. The difference between CoolSculpting® and liposuction is that CoolSculpting is a procedure that gets rid of stubborn fat effectively and safely without surgery; liposuction is invasive surgery. Thus far, the FDA has approved CoolSculpting for eight areas of the body: the abdomen, flanks, thighs, bra fat, back fat, banana roll, and the upper arms.
The concept came out of the academic world. Two Harvard scientists were doing a study where kids ate lots of popsicles, and they noticed the kids that ate more popsicles seemed to develop dimples in their cheeks. They theorized that the fat cells in the cheeks were dying from the cold temperatures, creating the leaner, dimpled cheeks. They were right.
They then decided to see if the same principle would apply to fat in other areas of the human body. The result was CoolSculpting®, which uses controlled cooling (cryolipolysis) to target and kill fat cells. Their discovery that fat cells freeze at a higher temperature than surrounding tissue cells was key. It allows these cells to be precisely targeted with the correct temperature to freeze them, but leaving adjacent cells unharmed. Those fat cells get the deep freeze treatment, kind of like a meat locker in North Jersey, and die. Over the next few weeks the dead fat cells are eliminated naturally by the body.
The procedure is simple and pain-free
At Beaty Facial Plastic Surgery, both Dr. Beaty and our clinical staff are graduates of CoolSculpting University, where treatment techniques are taught. We also use our InBody machine to provide a complete body analysis prior to your CoolSculpting session. This makes our team the perfect choice for your CoolSculpting® treatment. Once we settle on the areas you want to target, we position the device on those areas and it delivers controlled cooling into the skin. The procedure is simple — you can read, listen to music, check email, even take a nap during your session. CoolSculpting® is totally non-invasive, so you can return to your normal routine immediately.
The results will be as pleasing as you’ve imagined. Over the next few weeks to months after your CoolSculpting procedure, your body will naturally eliminate the dead fat cells, and once they are gone these cells are gone for good. CoolSculpting® results are permanent. Patients experience a 20 to 25% decrease in fat cells in the treatment sites.
Are you ready to tell your unwanted fat to “chill” during this Atlanta winter? Call Beaty Facial Plastic Surgery at (770) 753-0053 and set up a consultation for CoolSculpting®.
