It has been 18 days since my Cutera Pearl Fusion laser resourfacing treatment of the decollete, neck and vertical lines around my mouth. Plus frown lines.

I’m using a mild facial cleanser, followed by a rich moisturizing cream. I was using a barrier repair lipid formulation which is rich and creamy.  I recently switched and am testing a new skincare cream with stem cells to see if it will speed up the healing process.  I have only begun using it, so I can not comment on this yet.

My chest is slightly pink now it looks like a I  have a mild sunburn. My sun lesions look much better and I think the texture is better. Though I really need to see my before pics to compare. It looks smoother, yet  I still have the vertical lines, which also seem less noticeable.

My peri-oral area and frown lines are  still pink too. I can cover it with light mineral make-up. I purchased Oxygenetix by Ceravitae as a foundation cover-up for $60.00. It was too dark, too thick-  I found it pasty. Not a fan.  I prefer to use my Colorscience corrector kit.  Works great and blends well.

My neck area after the Pearl is not pink.  I was very conservative with the neck because I did not want to have any problems.  The laser nurse, Jeff, used  the lowest setting of the Peral Fractionated system.  The neck skin is so thin that you can run the risk of scarring if you have an aggressive treatment. I would rather opt for another treatment in this area, than be aggressive.  I am not sure that I notice any difference here.  If there is it is only slight improvement in color, no improvement in texture yet.

My opinion at this point:

I am not wowed about Laser resourfacing with  Pearl Fusion yet!  I see slight improvement and know that over time collagen builds. I will have a much better sense by August, whether I think this is worth the money.

If you really want significant improvement Co2 laser is still probably the way to go.. however, there is a lot of downtime associated with this type of Laser resourfacing procedure.

The Pearl Fusion– is milder with quicker recovery time.

Here are my observations.

It has been 2 months since my Pearl Fusion treatment on my chest, neck and peri-oral area.  Is it worth it??

I am not going to give a definitive answer yet, however, these are my observations.

1. My chest area is still slightly bumpy, slightly pink and in the light you can still see the vertical lines from sleeping all these years on my side. It does look a little better and smoother.

2. Hardly any pink around my mouth area. I really do not see much difference  in the vertical lines above my lips.  The laser nurse was agressive in this area using both YAG and Ablative. I will discuss setting and depth in another blog post. I developed a very small hypotropic scar above my lip line, which I hope resolves. I am not sure why this happened- however,  according to one dermatologist, I apparently healed too quickly in this area. I also noticed that my lips looked flatter, consequently I felt like a little Juverderm was in order.

3. My initial reaction is that Co2 Lasers are more effective in building collagen and go deeper.  This seems to be the gold standard. Cutera (http://www.cutera.com) is the manufacturer of the Pearl Fusion and it is not a Co2 Laser.  There is much controversy in the laser resurfacing arena.

So far I am not impressed with Cutera’s Pearl Fusion.

UPDATE:

SIX MONTHS LATER

Chest:

Slight difference in pigmentation, red bumps gone. Texture shows little improvement. No improvement with vertical chest lines.

Neck: No improvement

Peri-oral area (around the mouth):

Persistant bump above the lip area. It is unclear exactly what this bump is. There have been mix-diagnosis from various dermatologists. It coud be a hypertropic scar. However, it is not conclusive. What I do know is that is developed after the laser treatment. The fine lines are around my mouth are slightly better. However, I had Juverderm injected in certain areas that appear deeper or more noticeable than before the treatment. The results of the Pearl Fusion do not appear to be uniform. Some areas are showing deeper vertical lines than other areas.

 My overall opinion is that one treatment of the Pearl Fusion is not enough if you have pigmentation and vertical lip lines. Was it worth the price?  At this time I would say no.