Shereene IdrissBoard Certified Derm, Founder and Chief Nerd

Lasers: At What Age? #shorts

22 Mar 2023 · 1 min

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Dermatologist Shereene Idriss says there's no magic age to start lasers. Start when you have a specific problem: discoloration, redness, or acne scars. She warns against aggressive CO2 laser treatments in your early 20s.

Questions this video answers

No—there's no ideal age; it depends on the individual's skin concerns.

Discoloration, ruddy appearance or persistent redness, and textural acne scarring.

Early 20s.

As an ablative Fraxel-type procedure (they said 'where they burn your face off').

Chapters

So there's no ideal age to start laser treatments. It really depends on you and what your biggest issue is when you take a step back. Do you have a lot of discoloration, do you look ruddy, do you have a lot of redness? Do you have texturals change from acne scarring? And that's what you base it off of, especially if it's bothering you. But there is absolutely such a thing as being too young. I have had a few patients in their early 20s who've already had a CO2 laser, which is an ablative fraxel, like where they burn your face off. And these patients did not even have textural issues before the CO2 laser. They didn't even have bad acne scarring or anything. So there's definitely something as being too young. Be careful. If somebody's pushing this on you and you're still a fetus and they're trying to convince you that you can look younger than a fetus because that's just not possible.