What? We’ve had enough of winter already. Ah, but these freezing temperatures aren’t the kind you need to put a coat on for. These freezing temperatures you can enjoy while watching videos on your iPad, working of your laptop, or just taking a little nap. We’re talking about the freezing temperatures of CoolSculpting®, which despite being around for a decade now, is still the world’s most popular non-invasive fat reducing/body contouring procedure.
April’s a great time to come to our Salt Lake City or Park City offices for a CoolSculpting® session, as come the warmer temperatures of summer your body will really start showing the slimmer contours that come from losing almost a quarter of the fat in your treated areas.
It started with a bunch of Creamsicles
When the two scientists who invented CoolSculpting® came up with the idea they were actually investigating something else. Two doctors at the Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital, Drs. Dieter Manstein and R. Rox Anderson, were doing a study that theorized children who ate lots of popsicles developed dimples in their cheeks more than children who didn’t eat lots of popsicles. Dimples form in the cheeks where the muscle isn’t covered with much fat, so when the muscle contracts a dimple forms. The idea was that the cold in the popsicles somehow affected the fat cells in the cheeks. Their theory proved true, and the doctors called this Popsicle Panniculitis.
Based on their theory of what was happening in the cheeks, the two doctors further theorized that the same process/result could happen elsewhere. So, they investigated selectively freezing fat cells in a process they called cryolipolysis. The end result of those studies was CoolSculpting®. The FDA approved this new treatment in 2010 and who knows how many pounds of fat have been frozen and disposed of since then?!
How it works
To freeze the fat, CoolSculpting® uses a three-step process. First, a cooling panel uses suction to pull the target area skin into solid contact with the cooling plates. Then the cooling is directed downward into the skin. The temperature is precisely equal to the freezing point of fat cells, while not freezing adjacent tissue cells that freeze at a higher temperature. Exposure to this freezing causes fat cell apoptosis (a natural, controlled cell death). The body sends cytokines and other inflammatory mediators to the area to gradually digest the dead fat cells in the weeks following the CoolSculpting® session. Lipids from the dead fat cells are slowly released and transported by the lymphatic system to be processed and eliminated from the body, in the same manner that fat in food is eliminated. It takes anywhere from three to 12 weeks for the body to permanently remove the dead fat cells.
How much fat gets chilled out? A 20 to 23% decrease in fat cells in the treatment area over the months following your CoolSculpting® session at Saltz.
From its original FDA approval for the flanks, CoolSculpting® has since been approved for these additional areas:
- Abdomen
- Thighs
- Bra fat
- Back fat
- Banana roll
- Upper arms
- Chin area
Call us at Saltz Plastic Surgery/Spa Vitoria in our Salt Lake City office, (801) 274-9500, or our Park City office, (435) 655-6612, and set up your CoolSculpting session.
