#29: Barrett Facial Treatments

On this episode of The Natural Plastic Surgeon…

Dr. Barrett: If you have a special event on the weekend and you want something quick and easy, the Barrett Standard Treatment is the way to go. That basically combines the, the radiofrequency skin tightening, the Lightstim, and the peel, and boom. You've got no downtime, you are ready to go that night if you needed something--a quick, a quick boost--to get you going.

You are listening to The Natural Plastic Surgeon Podcast. I'm Dr. Daniel Barrett, Board-Certified Plastic and Reconstructive Surgeon located right here in Beverly Hills. I specialize in cosmetic surgery of the face, nose, breast and body. This podcast is dedicated to those deciding if plastic surgery is right for them and revealing all the latest beauty secrets. Let’s get started.

Dr. Barrett: Everybody it is Dr. Barrett, we are on Episode 29. Is that right? 29? The Natural Plastic Surgeon Podcast. Yes. All right. So this is a solo episode, you guys. We are going to talk about a specific thing that we do in our office. It is called the Barrett Facial Treatments.

01:00 BARRETT FACIAL TREATMENT

Now, what it is, is a combination therapy for your skin of your face, primarily, that I feel works 100 times better than any kind of facial you're gonna get anywhere else. Including HydraFacial or a standard facial that you might get at a spa. This is a medic, medical-grade treatment. And why we came up with this is because too many people are getting facials that, kind of, make your skin feel good or, kind of, make, you know, make a, a nice, slight improvement but there wasn't any real long-lasting results. We also do a lot of Botox, we also do a lot of filler, and there's a lot of things that Botox and filler are great for, but they don't address certain things like fine line skin wrinkles, underlying fascial and skin laxity, and blood flow and healing.

01:50 THE BARRETT STANDARD TREATMENT FOR SHORT DOWNTIME

Okay? So what, what we came up with, a lot of, with, with a lot of research is a combination therapy that involves Lightstim red light, radiofrequency skin tightening, and three different types of modality treatments. Either superficial peel, micro-needling or CO2 laser. Now the differences just depends on the amount of downtime you want to have. If you have a special event on the weekend and you want something quick and easy, the Barrett Standard Treatment is the way to go. That basically combines the, the radiofrequency skin tightening, the Lightstim, and the peel, and boom. You've got no downtime, you are ready to go that night if you needed something--a quick, a quick boost--to get you going.

The next step involves three days of downtime. That involves the micro-needling with PRP and I'll get into that in a minute. And then the third, more heavy-duty, kind of, resurfacing facial is the Barrett Premier and that involves that our Luminous Ultra Pulse CO2 laser.

02:45  LIGHTSTIM IS FDA APPROVED

Okay, so now each one of these combines multiple modalities for a synergistic result that is better than if we were to do each one of these, individually, on separate days. And, and why that works is actually pretty cool. So The Lightstim brings in blood supply, okay? So Lightstim is one of the, the, I think it's probably one of the best light stimulation or photo modulation devices that's out there. They have a handheld one, and they have, they, we actually have a very professional-grade panel that covers your whole face or body part that you're interested, we have that in the office. And it's actually FDA-approved. You guys may think this is frou-frou but it's, it's actually FDA-approved and they've done some real research on it. Cleared to temporarily, temporarily relieve arthritic pain, variety of minor aches, pains, relax muscles, increase blood circulation.

And it’s that increase of blood circulation that makes a difference for our treatments. Because when you combine that with a peel, when you combine that with a micro-needling, or you combine that with a laser, you've just supercharged your healing process. So what it does is it increases blood flow to the area. Actually lowers your blood pressure too, so it makes you feel much more relaxed and good. So when people get underneath the red light in the office, post-surgical, because we use it for post-surgical reduction of swelling and pain, they feel great right, off the bat. Because it helps lower your blood pressure.

They have full body Lightstim that you can do, and I do...a different company is called Joov, J-O-O-V, I have a panel in my house. And I do it every morning before I go into work, and it just wakes me up. It aligns my circadian rhythm and so forth.

04:20 LIGHTSTIM SUPERCHARGES REST OF TREATMENT

But what we found when we do it locally on the face, when we're about to do these treatments, is we open up the floodgates of blood flow to the area we're about to do a treatment on. So what that does is it just augments and supercharges the rest of the treatment that we do. So I don't know of anybody else that’s doing this. If you're not, you should be doing it. You should combine these things so that you get a better result of your treatment.

Because you really, you want your best bang for your buck. And more importantly, your time. You want to go a place, get a, a facial treatment that's gonna really make a difference. And that's what we came up with with this combination.

05:00 VENUS LEGACY TREATMENT

Now, the next step is using the Venus Legacy radiofrequency and Pulsed Electromagnetic Energy at the same time. Now that addresses the underlying area so we've got the photo modulation that's bringing in new blood supply. Now we're heating up the underlying tissues. And Venus Legacy--there's a bunch of companies that have radiofrequency...Thermage was, like, the first one that came out. But I like, I like Venus Legacy because it uses a multipol, multipolar technology, meaning it has lots of different electrodes that it circulates to radiofrequency energy so that you're not getting hotspots anywhere.

So you're able to get a more even distribution of heat without pain. So it's, like, nobody's gonna want to do this if it's painful. And it also actually delivers Pulsed Electromagnetic Fields as well, which is also great for healing and your recovery for your procedure. So you get the PEMF, you get the radiofrequency skin tightening and the, and the key to that is to raise the temperature. And we have temperature monitors when we do this on the face.

06:00 VENUS LEGACY CAN BE USED FOR JOWLS TREATMENT

Because we really, like, how many people, you know, that come to my office say, like, I want fillers in my cheeks so that my jowls don't show. Well, I'm sorry, it takes an awful lot of fillers, you end up looking like Joan Rivers--God rest her soul--if we were to just do fillers alone.

What, instead, you can do is either a facelift or you can do a Venus Legacy which tightens that underlying, that underlying fascia. It also reduces a little bit of fat at the same time, based on the temperature that you can get to. 43 degrees Celsius is the, is the target set for the Venus Legacy.

06:35 DOWNTIME

So you do that. You do the red light. And then you, you pick. You pick--how much downtime do you want?

Do you want no downtime and then we're just gonna do a stimulator peel? It's gonna be like a slight enzymatic debridement of the dead skin on your, on your face. And a, a Obagi Skin Cleanse, we do at the same time. So you end up looking great, and you've got really fresh, baby skin to, to go out for that weekend. Now if you want a much more deeper treatment, then micro-needling with PRP.

07:00 MICRO-NEEDLING AND PRP

Micro-needling is basically a pen--and there's a lot of rollers out there and yes, they work, but they don't go to the same depth that we can do in the medical office. That’s what a lot of people don't understand is, like, why can’t I just roll my face at home with a, with a, a micro-roller? And yeah, you can do that. And it helps. But you're not gonna get to the same depth and efficacy as you can with a micro-needling pen.

And when you do, yeah, we can go to one, we can actually go to two millimeters depth with the micro-needling pen. There's no, you can't come close to that with the rollers at home. And now what that does is it creates little microchannels for the product to get deep down into the deeper dermis and that's where the PRP kicks in.

If you don't know about PRP, it, it’s one of the most recent things that's come out in terms of reversing aging with minimal downtime, okay? It, it does this by stimulating the healing response. And so we stole this from the orthopedic surgeons who use them for hips. They use them for joints, to simulate a healing response to repair cartilage, um, without having to do surgery.

And they've had some promising, they’ve had some mixed results. Sometimes it doesn't work. A lot of times it actually works. And for some people, you know, delaying having surgery to replace a joint is a big deal. So we stole that from them because we realized that, you know what, when you stimulate a healing response in your skin, you're creating collagen.

08:20 SKIN CHANGES WITH AGING

So as you get older, when you're really young, your skin is super thick, okay, and as you get older, it gets thinner and thinner and thinner over time. So our goal is to reverse that, right? You can do that with skincare, with retinol, with vitamin C. Those have been, studies have shown that it's improved the collagen. Actually Botox actually improves collagen as well, independently of the relaxation effect.

But they have micro-needling with PRP, massive boost in your thickness of your skin. So little fine line wrinkles underneath the eyes, or around the mouth, disappear almost at the same level as a CO2 laser, okay? So it's that combination of that, that micro-needling that creates those channels and the effect of the PRP sinking into those channels where you can actually really see those results.

And typically takes several treatments to really, to get, you know, optimal results. We typically recommend about three of these treatments. But we noticed when we combined it with the Venus Legacy, radiofrequency and the Lightstim, results were way better. Okay? So the sum of all the individual parts was greater than the whole. Is that how you say it? Something like that. So all three of them combined together was a synergistic effect for a greater result than the sum of each of the individual parts.

09:40 THE BARRETT PREMIER TREATMENT

Okay? So...and then the last treatment that we, we offer is a more heavy-duty treatment. It’s called the Barrett Premier. And we do, we do the Lightstim, we do the Venus Legacy, but then we also do the CO2 laser. Now the CO2 laser, we also do PRP with that. So this is a more heavy-duty resurfacing. Seven to ten days downtime.

We have the world's, I, you know we have action, we actually have separate podcasts, we have a, a original podcast about the Lightstim, where I actually go to a Lightstim booth and I hop in. And so you can go back and check that out.

And I also have a, a podcast with the makers of Lumenis, who makes the CO2 laser, that you gotta check out as well. So you can, you can learn more about why their laser is the best.

Okay, so now when you combine it with all of that and the PRP, you're getting supercharged results and you're getting extreme skin resurfacing.

10:35 LASER TREATMENT FOR SKIN DAMAGE

So this is, this is great for somebody who has had a lot of skin damage or a lot of wrinkles. Because we're gonna get the depth with the deep FX, which is these, imagine these tiny little laser beams shooting full-thickness, all the way through, to the deepest dermis. That stimulates the collagen production like none other, okay?

And that's our goal. Is we want to create that collagen production so our skin, our dermis, thickens back up. Fine line wrinkles start to disappear, transparency of skin starts to go away. You don't want transparent, thin skin. When you look at an old person, that's what you see, you want the opposite. You want that youthful, thick skin that’s healthy and vibrant.

And you don't get that by putting moisturizer on your skin every day, you get that by stimulating and challenging your skin every single day. Okay, so that's why we offer these medical-grade treatments in our office because they, they're just way better than what you're going to get at, at, at a standard place.

11:25 COST OF TREATMENTS

The cost is very reasonable. The Barrett Standard, I think, current pricing, subject to change, is $949. The Barrett Signature is $1499, and The Barrett Premier is $2999. And these are great treatments depending on how much downtime you want, and, and the results that you're looking to achieve.

11:40 SERIES OF TREATMENTS

All right, so we got a couple questions here. So would I suggest doing these treatments in a series?

Yes, I would. I, I typically recommend, well, with the exception of the, the, the lighter version, the lighter version can be done pretty much whenever you want. That's The Barrett Standard. You can do that before going out on the weekend, when you're trying to get to more therapeutic significant changes, we recommend series of three of The Barrett Signature or The Barrett Premier. You're going to just see the best results. Collagen production occurs over six months after your last treatment. Okay? So it doesn't, it doesn't end within that first couple weeks of that healing phase.

12:15 THE BARRETT SIGNATURE IS THE MOST POPULAR

Our most popular is The Barrett Signature. That's with the micro-needling. Because the downtime’s only three days and you’re results are amazing, okay? All of this is very tolerated. We use lots of numbing medicine, you don't feel anything during the procedure, so pain should not be an issue.

12:35 FACELIFT

What would you suggest a series of facials for someone too young for full-on facelift? Absolutely, you know, facelifts, I'm doing more, less and less of them. I certainly think that they're a great option for people that have started way too late in, in terms of rejuvenation.

But if you give me somebody in their 30’s, and we start right now with Botox and a good treatment plan. And a good maintenance plan, every six months with one of these facials, you will not need a facelift when you're 80 or 90 years old.

There is, there's just so much going on right now that facelifts are really gonna be a thing of the past. Nobody really wants that downtime. Nobody wants those surgical risks. I do a great facelift, you guys, and I love to do it. But I do a modified version with fat transfer. But, you know, it’s surgery. It's a big, it's a big deal. And it's very expensive. And I think that if you do regular maintenance starting at a young age, you won't need a facelift when you get older.

13.20 PAINLESS TREATMENTS

We talked about why I chose Venus Legacy. And you know, there's another, there's other energy modality. There's ultrasound products like the L-THERAPY, which works, but that's super painful. Again, I never want anything in my office that just causes a lot of pain. That's why dentists have the, the highest suicide rates because they, they don't like causing pain on people. And it, it affects them long term. I don't want to cause pain on people. That's why I use anesthesia and I use things that are not painful. Okay?

13:50 ROSALYN LOVES MICRONEEDLING

What facial would I give Rosalyn? Rosalyn’s my wife and she loves the micro-needling and, and I would, I would do that. Although she does have some acne scarring that has always been a problem for her. And so when she's not pregnant, we're planning to do a Barrett Premiere. Try the CO2 laser and we're certainly going to film that for you guys. So check it out on our social media.

14:10 WHEN TO DO THE SURGERY

When do you know it's time to go under the knife? Well, typically if you're starting late in the game, you haven't been doing preventative maintenance and you've got a lot of skin laxity, a lot of jowling might be, might be your best bet. It would take a lot, you know, I get people, I can do everything from skincare to Botox fillers, to minimally invasive surgeries like fat grafting and CO2 laser, with the combined Venus Legacy, all the way up to full-on facelifts and fat grafting. And sometimes when people start late in the game, I say, look, you're cheap...even though this is an expensive surgery, for me to do all these fillers over time, blah, blah, blah, you're going to be looking at a cheaper price tag with the surgery and a much better result faster than trying to do all these minimum invasive, minimally invasive things. So if you've, if you're 70 years old and you've got a lot of laxity, and you haven't even tried Botox once, chances are you might need to go under the knife and, and actually get a surgery.

15:05 ANTIBIOTIC OR RETINOL AND SKIN TREATMENT

What if I'm taking antibiotics or retinol? Can I still get a facial?

Well, it depends on what you're actually taking the medication for. If you're taking retinol for acne, or if you're taking antibiotics for this acne, I want the, the acne to be under control. And we can do that here with a lot of skincare products as well. But we want to treat the active breakout that's going on in the skin and we carry the ZO Obagi Skincare Line which is actually part of this treatment. You can actually get a ZO Obagi Facial Cleanse, which is a deep cleanse that you get right prior to the, the actual facial you get. And that typically, when we start patients, if you give this a few weeks ahead of time, we can clear up most breakouts with some other, their anti-acne medications and scrubs.

15:50 QUICK SUMMARY

So that is it, you guys. Quick summary on a Barrett Medical Spa Facials:

We have The Barrett Standard, which is a combination of the LightStim, radiofrequency skin tightening and the stimulator peel, as well as the Obagi Facial Cleanse. That’s $949.

Then we have The Barrett Signature, which is combination of the micro-needling, PRP, LED light therapy, radiofrequency, and the, the Obagi Skincare Cleanse. That's $1499, three days of downtime.

And then The Barrett Premiere, which is about seven to ten days downtime. That is $2999. And that is a powerful punch in the CO2 laser. We also provide some Pro-Nox with that as well. It's a, it's a nitric oxide gas that you can just breathe and it just helps you relax during the whole procedure.

And again, I've, I, I actually haven't told you this, but I have had a Barrett Signature, and I honestly, I feel like it took five years off my skin. I'm due for another one, which we're gonna show you guys, probably, on social media. The esthetician can't wait to get her hands on me. I promise. And we will show you guys what that's all about.

But that's it, you guys. Just a quick solo episode on facial treatments. This goes beyond, this goes beyond Botox and fillers. And if that's all you're getting, you're missing it. Okay?

I call it the four R's, all right? So relax with Botox, refill with a little bit of filler, resurface with the laser or micro-needling or peel. And then you want to re-lift the area with a radio frequency or energy-based device to get the deeper tissues. If you're not doing all the fours, you're missing a component and you're not gonna get optimal results.

If you guys have any questions, check out my website. I have all this information under my procedures page on DrDanielBarrett.com. Thank you guys for tuning in.

Thank you for tuning into our podcast. If you liked today's podcast, don't forget to share, rate, review and subscribe. Also, find out if plastic surgery is right for you by using our virtual consultation at DrDanielBarrett.com/virtual-consultation. See you soon

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