Dr. Lorrie Klein’s Blog

These are tough economic times.  But we still want to feel good about ourselves and to look our best.  While many of my patients can still afford to do whatever they want to do for themselves, I have many patients who would love to do more for themselves than they can currently afford.  Luckily there are still many great cosmetic procedures you can do as a second choice treatment.  You can always put the first choice, best treatment on your “wish list” for the future.

Here are some common cosmetic treatments and their less expensive alternatives:

Instead of a:

Nose Job - get a filler nose job with Radiesse or Artefill (it takes just 10 minute and looks good immediately)

Face Lift - get a Liquid Face Lift or Fraxel CO2 re:pair laser treatment

Botox Crow’s Feet or Frown Lines - just get a Botox Brow Lift

Photo-Facial (IPL) for texture and brown spots- get a series of medical microdermabrasions

Microdermabrasion- get a series of light glycolic peels

Light Peels - use physician-strength skin care products

Vivite Complete Skin Care System - use Vivite Daily Moisturizer with SPF 30

Obagi Nu-derm System- use Vivite Vibrance with Obagi C-clarifying serum

Fraxel CO2 re:pair Laser - get a series of Fraxel re:store laser treatments

Fraxel re:store Laser - get a series of Photo-Facials (IPL) 

Juvederm lip plumping - get a half size syringe and just outline and define your lips 

Juvederm/Radiesse/Artefill treatment for wrinkles - get a smaller size syringe and treat the most important areas 

Laser Hair Removal on legs - just laser your underarms or bikini areas for now

Eyelashes Extensions - use Lumigan at home (it’s also better than extensions since it grows your own eyelashes)

Any comments from my readers and patients?

I am very excited to announce that we are the first office in South Orange County to have the Fraxel CO2 Re:pair Laser.  This is a new laser that became available this year, that takes the regular Fraxel (now known as the Fraxel “re:store” to the next level.  Best of all, you will only need 1 treatment!

Many of you may be familiar with the old CO2 lasers that did a great job in removing wrinkles and scars but had several weeks of down time, left the skin red for months and had a high incidence of depigmentation (loss of color.)  Because of these effects the CO2 laser fell out of favor among both physicians and patients and many physicians such as myself stopped using it.

The Fraxel CO2 re:pair laser combines fractionalized laser technology with CO2 technology to give us the best of both worlds: deeper, more effective treatment of wrinkles and scars, plus great skin tightening (some researchers feel it might eventually replace face lifts) with the faster healing and decreased down time of Fraxel, with just 1 treatment.

Yes, there will be some downtime (everything is always a compromise!), but it will be only 3-5 days, not weeks.  Also, according to the company there has not been any reports of depigmentation to date.

We will be ready to start treating patients in a few weeks.   Call my office at 949-363-1788 if you would like to be put on our interest list for this incredible treatment (no obligation, we’ll just let you know when we start scheduling treatments.)  I will have an informational handout and page on my website shortly.  We will also be havng an informational seminar October 30th in the evening.  More information to follow. 

Send your comments or questions if you have any.