Tattoo Removal

Our Tattoo Removal tips can help you resolve that awful feeling of tattoo regret.

Your Problem: You would like to have a certain tattoo removed from where it presently resides on your body.

What Compounds Your Problem: Having a tattoo removed is much more easily said than done.  Even evaluating what the best tattoo removal method is can be overwhelming.

There are so many different tattoo removal methods about which you hear grossly conflicting claims regarding their effectiveness, painfulness and cost. How do you know who to trust and what to believe?

Trying to sort through and understand all of the tattoo removal methods on offer can be a daunting task in and of itself.

What Follows Is a Concise List of the Alternatives:

• Tattoo Fading Creams (Tat B Gone, Wrecking Balm, TAT-Med)

• Rejuvi

• Laser Treatments

• IPL (Intense Pulsated Light Therapy)

• Chemical Peels (TCA)

• Surgical Procedures (Dermabrasion, Cryosurgery, Excision, Tissue Expansion, Salabrasion)

Rejuvi seems to be more or less on the up and up. It was developed by a Dr. Wade Cheng, who at any rate seems to be a real person, unlike Wrecking Balm’s “Doc Wilson,” Tat B Gone’s Dr. “Jahn Ericson” or Profade’s “Jahn Ericsson.”

It is a specially formulated cream that is injected into the tattoo to be removed by a tattooist (you can read a detailed description of how Rejuvi works by clicking on the link).

Rejuvi is formulated to bond with the ink, and bring it to the surface of the skin, where a brownish scab will form. It usually takes about one or two weeks for the scab to fall off. During this time, you must be careful to not let it get wet. Several hour-long treatments are required, with a two to three month waiting period between each treatment.

Rejuvi is not guaranteed to completely remove your tattoo, but it does work for some tattoos. Large, deep and old tattoos are not good candidates for removal by Rejuvi. There is some risk of scarring and  hypo-pigmentation (permanent loss of skin color). The biggest risk posed by Rejuvi is that of infection, and there is a lot of aftercare required of the patient between treatments.

The advantages of Rejuvi as opposed to laser treatments is that it is a bit cheaper and less painful.
Laser treatments are one of the most popular and effective means of removing unwanted tattoos.

But even laser treatments are not 100% guaranteed to completely remove all tattoos. When I inquired about tattoo removal on a site called JustAnswer.Medical on May 14 of 2010, I received this advice:

“You should see a dermatologist or plastic surgeon. Q-switched YAG laser is most often used to remove tattoos. This requires several sessions over months. Each session lasts five to 15 minutes, depending on the size and color of the tattoo. Usually, fading of the tattoo is the best result that can be accomplished. Sometimes the tattoo will disappear.”

This doctor mentions the Q-switched YAG laser which is effective in removing black, blue, red and orange inks. The Q-switched Ruby laser is useful for removing green ink, and the Q-switched Alexandrite laser is effective on green and blue-black tattoos. Generally speaking, it’s a good idea to find a clinic that has all three types of Q-switched lasers, which many clinics do.

Actually though, the most advanced laser available today is the VersaPulse C Laser. It’s a four-in-one system, and not only is it effective in removing any color of ink, it is also less painful than conventional lasers. The only downside to the VersaPulse C Laser is that only a limited number of clinics are using it at present.

The major drawback to laser treatments is their cost. One treatment can dent your pocketbook in the neighborhood of  from $200 to $500, and from 5 to 20 treatments may be necessary, depending on a number of factors, including the size, age, and color of your tattoo, the type of ink used, and whether it was done by a professional or an amateur.

Oh yeah, and it kind of hurts, as you can see in the videos below.
The video first video below shows the guy toughin’ it out, even though it seems to hurt more than he’s letting on.

The video below is a ten minute segment from L.A. Ink that goes more deeply into tattoo regrets and the whole process of getting a large tattoo removed by laser.

IPL(Intense Pulsed Light therapy) looks very similar to laser therapy, but uses high intensity light instead of lasers to remove tattoos. It’s said to be less painful than laser treatments and to require fewer treatment sessions to for a particular tattoo, but it is also generally more expensive than laser treatments.

Chemical Peels such as TCA (Trichloroacetic Acid) are a cheaper alternative that can be done at home. TCA is a medium depth peel used by dermatologists, cosmeticians, and plastic surgeons to remove or diminish such things as acne scars, fine lines and age spots. It is the second most common method of tattoo removal after lasers, and it has a longer history, as laser tattoo removal treatments did not become widespread and effective until the early ’90s with the introduction of the Q-switched YAG laser.

TCA has been in use as a tattoo removal treatment since the 1920s. The results of a six-year study of 670 outpatients of Newcastle General Hospital were published in the March 1988 issue of the British Journal of Plastic Surgery. The study found that TCA was 85% effective in the fading or removal of tattoos.

These days, a 50% solution of TCA is common for tattoo removal treatments, and 93% of users report satisfaction with the results. But, as is the case with laser, it will take multiple treatments of TCA to markedly fade your tattoo, and there is a waiting period between each treatment (in the case of TCA, 4-6 weeks) to allow your skin to heal, so it is a time consuming process.

It takes sticktoitiveness. A study which appeared in the August 1991 issue of the British Medical Journal records that out of 57 patients who underwent tattoo removal treatments, “Trichloroacetic acid gave a good or fair result in 22 patients and a poor result in one; 34 patients did not complete the treatment.”

As for side effects, approximately 10-20% of user TCA may notice some adverse skin reaction. TCA does not cause scarring but can cause blistering, slight to moderate pain, and discoloration of the surrounding skin. For those with darker skin tones, there is a risk of hypopigmentation–a loss of skin color due to melanin depletion.

Saline injection is a the injection of a saline solution directly into a tattoo in order to blur it prior to having it covered up with a new tattoo. Some tattoo parlors offer this treatment, but it is usually not effective enough to completely remove an unwanted tattoo. It will break up the ink to the extent that the tattoo becomes less distinct and easier to cover up. Saline injections are generally not particularly expensive, but again, they are best thought of as a tattoo diminishing method rather than a tattoo removal method.

Surgical Procedures:

Generally speaking, surgical removal of tattoos was what people did before the advent of effective laser treatments in the late 1980s. The methods described below are still in use today, are in most cases cheaper than laser treatments, and in most cases involve pain and scarring.

Dermabrasion is best described as the wearing down of the top layers of skin (the epidermis and the upper dermis) with a high-speed rotary tool employing either a wire or diamond-tipped head. It has a long history: the ancient Egyptians practiced a form of dermabrasion using alabaster and pumice as far back as 1550 B.C.

The risks include hyperpigmentation (darkening of the skin due to an excess of melanin), hypopigimentation (loss of skin color due to melanin depletion), infection, and scarring.

It can be an effective method of tattoo removal if done by a skilled doctor and combined with meticulous aftercare to mitigate scarring.

The Internet Journal of Plastic Surgery describes a 2002~2006 study done on 26 patients which resulted in very high rate of success and patient satisfaction with just one layered dermabrasion tattoo removal treatment.

Cryosurgery involves the freezing of the skin with liquid nitrogen. This kills the skin cells in the area treated, causing the skin to eventually drop off. Cryosurgery is a relatively inexpensive surgical procedure, but several treatments are usually required to fade a tattoo.

This what a Dr. Setrag A. Zacarian, a clinical professor of dermatology at the Yale University School of Medicine, wrote in reference to a study on tattoo removal by cryosurgery done by two of his colleagues in 1980:

“The authors were as sanguine as I was some 10 years ago when I first utilized cryosurgery for the ablation of tattoos. After treating six patients with tattoos, many of them considerably more extensive than the four cases presented by Doctors Dvir and Hirschowitz, I abandoned cryosurgery as a satisfactory or an acceptable modality for the removal of tattoos.
My end results were no more acceptable than those portrayed by these authors. Atrophy, hyperpigmentation, and scarring were irreversible sequelae following cryosurgery.
In my own opinion and experience, I do not advocate cryosurgery for removalof tattoos.”

Excision is the simple but radical procedure of cutting an unwanted tattoo off with a scalpel and then sewing up the resulting wound. A skin graft may be required depending on the size of the tattoo and the looseness of the skin on the part of the body where it resides.

Excision is an expensive but effective option for the removal of smaller tattoos. It is performed under a local anesthetic, so the surgical risks are low. But it is an invasive procedure, so it is not risk free, and you will be left with a permanent scar. If you opt for having an unwanted tattoo excised, you should of course be sure to find a competent surgeon to perform the operation.

Tissue Expansion is a less common method of tattoo removal. It is an expensive and time-consuming process which basically involves expanding the skin under the tattoo with a balloon-like device in order to promote the growth of new skin. Eventually, the tattoo can be cut off and the new skin is sewn together over the resulting wound.

This is an outpatient procedure which requires a small incision for a silicone balloon expander to be inserted under the skin and regular visits to the doctor’s office for injections of the saline solution that inflates the balloon. There is some risk that the balloon will break or leak and have to be replaced, but the saline solution itself is harmless to the body.

Salabrasion, as the name suggests, is a tattoo removal method which involves abrading the skin with salt and water, rubbed into the skin with an abrasive tool. Like dermabrasion, it is a centuries-old method which is still in practice today. On the up side, it’s reportedly less painful than it sounds, and it is an effective tattoo removal method. On the down side, it will leave a scar. The scarring may not be too bad if the procedure is done by a professional, but even so, there will be some scarring. There is of course also a risk of the treated area becoming infected. One treatment usually takes 30 or 40 minutes, and generally speaking, more than one treatment is required to completely remove a tattoo.

This is not something you should try at home kids. If you need more convincing on that score, click on the link for a harrowing firsthand account of D.I.Y. salabrasion.

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