Laser Treatments for Nail Fungus

When you get a fungus under your nails it looks awful and it makes your fingers or toes itch, nails turn yellow and thick, and very hard to get rid of. I had a fungus under 2 of my toenails for several years and finally did something about it just this year.

If you catch the fungus early enough you can get rid of it with Lamisil cream but once it is under the nail and in the blood stream, forget about it.

When I went into the foot doctor’s office I was fully expecting to get a prescription for pills to get rid of the fungus. Normally that is how you get rid of it.

The pill method takes up to 9 months. And, you have to get a blood test to make sure your liver is okay. You take the pills every single day for 3 months and then the medicine stays in your system for another 6 months. The doctor told me you won’t see new growth for about 9 months.

A new way to get rid of nail fungus is laser treatments. The doc said it would still take as long for the fungus to go away but I only need to get one laser treatment every 3 months, so 3 times total.

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Top surgeon warns against hair transplants too young

Young men shouldn't have operations as soon as they start losing hair, according to one of the country's leading hair transplant surgeons.

He has told BBC Newsbeat some clinics are not doing enough to warn under-30s about the long-term risks.
Doctor Bessam Farjo says he has had enquiries from men as young as 19 but does not recommend hair transplants for under-25s.

He is warning men to avoid surgery until they are closer to the age of 30.

He said that while the publicity in celebrities like Wayne Rooney getting the procedure is making it more popular, it is not for everyone.


"When a celebrity comes out with it, you only hear the good things," he said. "You don't hear the cautions or the potential complications."

He says that if you get surgery too young, it can look worse than it did in the first place.

He said: "If you have the surgery too early and you go bald, you don't have enough hair to keep chasing the hair loss.

"You can end up with isolated patches of hair. You could end up with hairy temples and a bald forehead which isn't pretty but is also hard to fix."

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Laser Hair Loss Therapy Information

Low-level laser hair loss therapy is now recognized throughout Europe and in the USA as an effective treatment for most forms of hair loss, including male and female pattern baldness.

The use of low-level laser therapy (LLLT), although shown in some studies to be effective in improving the thickness and fullness of hair on its own, is often combined with proven scalp and hair re-growth products for a full hair loss treatment program.

Repeat treatments are required weekly for approximately 6 months, depending on the extent of hair loss. You will normally also be given specific hair care and hair re-growth products for at-home use, in combination with the laser therapy, to try and achieve the best results possible.

Prices for laser hair loss therapy start from £45 per session. A full six month laser hair loss treatment program, including the combined hair care and re-growth products, such as Minoxidil or Finasteride, can start from £1,500.

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Vaseline Versus Expensive Scar Remedies

Diane Lane, Sandra Bullock and Harrison Ford are box office icons in spite of prominent facial scars.

But, for the most part, we view scars as disfiguring and have no patience to sit by and watch them heal, which can take six months to two years. Instead, we slather on expensive products, including onion extract gels, vitamin oils and creams, silicone gels and antibiotic ointments. These elixirs run up a hefty bill when used for months.

Dr. Terence Davidson, professor of surgery at UC San Diego School of Medicine, reporting to the Los Angeles Times on April 17, 2011, says, “Save your money.” There are many old wives’ tales to buy into and a slew of products you can buy, but none have been scientifically proven to work.

If a scar gets better after months of applying a remedy, how do you know if the treatment or time made a difference? Scar remedies are a gray area because it’s hard to test them with well-designed studies. Since everyone heals differently a good study would compare treatments on two similar scars in the same person, or on two halves of the same scar.

Davidson is backed up by a dermatological surgeon. “The only thing really shown to help the healing process and minimize scarring is keeping a wound moist and covered.” Most scar products do that, but so does petroleum jelly. In fact, in two randomized comparison trials of Mederma and petroleum jelly, Mederma did not improve the appearance of scars any more than petroleum jelly, and Vitamin E doesn’t do any better.

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Beauty Buzz: Lavender and Botox a Good Combination

Thinking about trying some anti-wrinkle Botox Cosmetic injections, but feeling just a bit squeamish about needles in your face?

Try inhaling some lavender essential oil just before you hit the dermatologist's office and the whole treatment may seem a lot easier to endure.

That’s the suggestion of a new study just published in the June issue of the Journal of Cosmetic Dermatology by doctors from the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine and the Baumann Cosmetic and Research Institute , both in Miami Beach, Florida.

Here, the researchers found that patients who were treated to the scent of lavender essential oils just before receiving their injection for wrinkles had a significant reduction in heart rate both pre and post treatment, when compared to those treated with a placebo scent.

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Wrinkles Reveal Clues to Women's Bone Health

Your laugh lines may offer clues to the health of your bones, according to a new study.

The results show that for women in their 40s and 50s, the worse their skin wrinkles are, the lower their bone density is.

"This information…may allow for the possibility of identifying postmenopausal women at fracture risk at a glance, without dependence on costly tests," said study researcher Dr. Lubna Pal, a reproductive endocrinologist at Yale School of Medicine in New Haven, Conn.

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Having Botox too soon could make you look old before your time

Cosmetic specialist Darren McKeown on the pros and cons of this treatment

When Alastair and Jean Carruthers published their first paper on the anti-wrinkle effect of Botox, the average age of their patients was 41 years. That was in 1992. I wonder if they ever thought back then that their new wonder drug would one day allegedly be used on little girls who take part in beauty pageants.

Earlier this month, a pageant mum from California, Kerry Campbell, shocked the world when she went on American TV and claimed to inject her eight-year-old daughter, Britney, with Botox. She said her daughter asked for the treatment to take away the wrinkles she gets when she smiles, and insisted that plenty of other pageant mothers do the same. An international media frenzy transpired, leading Californian authorities to take the child into care. The mother subsequently retracted her statements, claiming it was all a hoax to attract media attention.

But this is not the first time the issue of under-age Botox has hit the headlines. Last year, there was another media storm when a British mother, Sarah Burge, the self-proclaimed "Human Barbie", told the world that she was giving her 15-year-old daughter Botox injections, coining the phrase "teen-toxing" in the process.

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Would you risk a Botox boob job? It costs just £700, gives an instant lift without surgery and claims to have no side-effects.

The effects of gravity can be cruel to women, especially when it comes to breasts.

Even with a good bra, the ravages of time combined with breastfeeding and yo-yo dieting conspire to make once pert and firm breasts go droopy.

And then there’s sun damage, which results in crepey, blotchy skin on the decolletage.
In the past, a woman who wanting a breast lift had only one option: a major surgery known as a mastopexy.

This involves removing excess skin and repositioning the breasts. It’s very expensive at £3,000, requires several weeks of recovery time, and can result in a loss of sensation in the nipple area.

Now, however, a new treatment — the Botox breast lift — is available in the UK. This new treatment promises instant results with no side-effects and no recovery time.

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Non-Surgical Lipolysis Banned in France

According to an article in French magazine Anti-Age, the French High Authority of Health (HAS) has recently prohibited the use of a variety of different lipolysis (fat killing) cosmetic procedures.

The online magazine states that :

The implementation of the techniques referred to as lipolytic non invasive, using external physical agents, without breaking the skin (focussed ultrasound, radiofrequency, laser, etc..) has a suspicion of serious danger to human health.

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A little lipo with your facial, madam?

The number of people having both cosmetic surgery and beauty treatments such as botox are increasing.

But in this week's Scrubbing Up, consultant plastic surgeon Fazel Fatah, president of the British Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons (BAAPS), warns lines between the two are being blurred, and more effective regulation is needed.

You wouldn't trust your boiler to an unqualified engineer - so why do people continue to trust their face and body to untrained practitioners?

There is a difference between plastic surgery - facelifts, breast enhancement, tummy tucks, liposuction, etc - and cosmetic salon treatments such as lasers, peels and injectable fillers.

But the two are being confused in a way that trivialises surgery and puts patients in real danger.

Alarmingly, there are many practitioners offering procedures that require specialised surgical training and expertise which they do not have - and there is no regulation whatsoever to protect the public.

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