Just as Dr. Bunkis and I discovered that occasionally we need to reset ourselves, our skin can sometimes benefit from a reset as well.
As the days become shorter and we generally spend less time in intense sunlight, fall and winter can be excellent seasons to consider skin resurfacing. Years of Southern California sunshine can leave their calling cards: uneven pigmentation, brown spots, fine lines, rough texture and other visible signs of photodamage.
The appropriate resurfacing treatment depends upon the patient’s skin type, degree of sun damage, goals and tolerance for downtime.
TCA (trichloroacetic acid) peels are available in different concentrations and depths. A 20% TCA peel provides a lighter resurfacing and may be appropriate for relatively mild pigmentation and texture irregularities. A 35% TCA peel penetrates more deeply and can produce more significant improvement in sun damage, pigmentation and fine lines—but also requires more healing time and careful patient selection.
Phenol peels represent a much deeper form of chemical resurfacing. They can produce dramatic improvement in appropriately selected patients with significant photoaging and deeper wrinkles, but the increased depth also means greater downtime and greater potential risks. These are not treatments to be undertaken casually and are not appropriate for every skin type or every patient.
