Five Advantages of Chemical Peels Over Lasers

Patients have a wide range of choices available when it comes to skin rejuvenation. There are rollers bearing numerous tiny needles to stimulate collagen production, devices that deliver radiofrequency energy into deep layers, and diamond-tipped wands to polish away the worn outer layers. Two of the most popular treatments for skin rejuvenation are lasers and chemicalpeels. San Francisco Bay Area facial cosmetic surgeon Dr. Stanley Jacobs has studied the human face and its skin for years, ultimately coming to the conclusion that chemical peels offer a distinct advantage over lasers.

1) Quality of Results

In Dr. Jacobs’ experience, chemical peels tend to provide a more natural-looking result than lasers. As a facial cosmetic surgeon, he has used both treatments to rejuvenate his patients’ skin, starting lasers in the 1990s and chemical peels long before that. Using both allowed him to compare the results over time.

“In the 2000s, I found that, with lasers, healing was a lot longer and risks of depigmentation and scarring was higher,” Dr. Jacobs said. “Even if that wasn’t the case, I felt that the patient’s skin looked a little waxy or plastic looking.”

Lasers can remove the outermost layers of skin, as well as heat and remodel collagen within the skin, which Dr. Jacobs likened to “melting.” The ultimate result is smoother skin, but with a quality that some people can find to appear unnatural.

Chemical peels remove the outermost layers of skin, and can be applied in concentrations that take facial contours and variations in skin thickness into account.

2) Location of Application

Historically, lasers worked well for the face, but were too intense for less-resilient neck skin. When a treatment is used on one area but not another, the ultimate difference between the treated skin and untreated skin can be stark.

Now, there are lasers to treat the neck, but Dr. Jacobs emphasizes chemical peels as the consistently unifying option that can generate results without creating a divisional line between the neck and the face.

More specifically, Dr. Jacobs likens the application of chemical peels to painting a portrait as opposed to rolling paint onto a living room wall. Rather than a sort of one-surface-fits-all approach that blankets the skin with an indiscriminate layer, the technique that yields the best, most-natural results involves using as much or as little as needed in the various regions that make up a face.

3) Risks

Every cosmetic procedure comes with risk. The reality is that any time a doctor treats someone’s skin—whether with needles, radiofrequency energy, lasers, or chemicals—there is a chance of less-than-ideal results. In Dr. Jacobs’ experience, lasers carry a higher risk than chemical peels in terms of depigmentation, which is loss of color within the treated skin. The resulting lighter patch can be noticeable and undesirable. In certain instances, lasers can also lead to scarring, which Dr. Jacobs also finds to be less of a risk with chemical peels.

4) Facelift Compatibility

In developing a synergistic combination of chemical peels and facelift, San Francisco’s Dr. Jacobs found that the trichloroacetic acid peel (commonly known as a TCA peel) can be used at a strength of 25 to 30 percent concurrent with the surgery to improve the quality of the skin along with reshaping the facial contours.

As he was developing his SynergyLift™, lasers were much stronger than a peel, and so were not appropriate to pair with a surgical lift.

“It wasn’t safe at all to do them together,” Dr. Jacobs said.

Today, he still finds that the chemical peels and lift combo pair to yield the best results.

5) Recovery

Recovery time for chemical peels is shorter than for a laser treatment that yields comparable results.

“The facelift takes about two weeks to heal before people go back to work—sometimes three weeks,” Dr. Jacobs said. “The peel’s already healed by then, so that doesn’t slow them down.”

TCA chemical peels at 25 to 30 percent strength can heal in less than 10 days.

“If you do a laser to get the same end results three to six months later, you’re going to take two to three times longer to heal,” Dr. Jacobs explained. “People can heal quickly with a peel.”

Learn more about facelifts, chemical peels, and other treatments from San Francisco Bay Area facial cosmetic surgeon Dr. StanleyJacobs. For more information, call his cosmetic surgery practice in Healdsburg at (707) 473-0220 or in San Francisco at (415) 433-0303.