We all want to look forever young, with smooth skin and no wrinkles. A protein found in our skin called collagen is our fountain of youth; it gives our skin elasticity, tightness, firmness and structure. Unfortunately, as we age our skin loses collagen and does not produce as much as it used to. This is one of the reasons we start to see wrinkles, sagging and drooping of our skin. Loose skin can affect our entire face. As our forehead starts to sag our brows begin to droop. That brow descent then affects our eyes and we start to see hooding of our upper eyelids. Our eyes don’t appear as “open” as they once were and we start looking tired all the time. Our cheeks will start to flatten out, and the smile lines around our mouths deepen. We also eventually lose the nice angles of our jawline. So how can we stop these changes from happening? There are many treatments out there today which attempt to promote collagen production to slow the signs of aging. Ultherapy and Thermage are the two most popular non-surgical treatments for tightening loose skin of the face and neck, however, they are not created equal. Read on to learn why Ultherapy is the best treatment to tighten your loose skin.
Ultherapy
Ultherapy is the only FDA approved, non-invasive, non-surgical way to tighten, tone and lift the skin of the face and neck. Here’s how it works: Ultherapy uses a focused ultrasound wave to deliver heat energy into the specific layers of the skin that contain collagen. This will tell our skin to start producing more collagen. Over a period of time the new collagen regeneration will give you back what time has taken away. Your skin will look years younger as it starts to firm, tighten and lift naturally. With Ultherapy, we can precisely place the collagen generating heat energy in both the superficial and deep layers of the skin. This way we can achieve the highest level of skin tightening possible without surgery. Experienced Ultherapy doctors such as Dr. Zadeh are able to customize the amount of thermal energy delivered to your skin based on your individual needs. The safety of ultrasound allows us to bypass the most superficial layers of the skin, therefore preventing the burning, scarring and pigmentation changes which may occur with other laser and heat based treatments.
Differences Between Thermage and Ultherapy
Thermage is also a non-surgical way to tighten the appearance of our skin. Unlike Ultherapy, Thermage uses radiofrequency to generate heat. This heat radiofrequency can only penetrate 2mm under the skin, whereas Ultherapy’s ultrasound waves penetrate 4.5mm under the skins surface. That’s more than twice as deep as Thermage can go! Also, because Thermage does not use ultrasound to bypass the more superficial layers of the skin it can cause burning, hyperpigmentation and scarring. There is also a large amount of pain with Thermage treatments compared to Ultherapy. After your Thermage treatment your skin will be red, peeling and feel sunburned. You will not see these negative affects from Ultherapy. When getting a Thermage treatment you may want to block out a few days to peel and for your skin to heal before you resume your normal schedule. With Ultherapy you have no downtime, and no peeling/healing days. You can apply makeup a few hours after your Ultherapy is done, and resume your normal schedule.
Why Ultherapy is better than Thermage
To sum up, here are the main reasons why Ultherapy is a better skin tightening treatment than Thermage: Ultherapy
- Non-Surgical
- Non-Invasive
- Treats up to 4.5mm depth/ Penetrate 8mm
- Little to no risk of burning/scars/hyperpigmentation
- No Downtime
Thermage
- Non-Surgical
- Treats up to 2 mm depth
- High Risk of burning/scars/hyperpigmentation
- Downtime for skin to peel and heal
Have you had Ultherapy or Thermage? We’d love to hear your experiences in the comments section below!