Cool Sculpting
Serving the Upper East Side New York, NY area
The Cool Solution
Do you feel that no matter how much you sweat it in the gym or on the trail, you just can't get rid of that pooch? Does it seem that no matter how many calories you count and how much you control your portion size, those love handles have a grip on you that just won't quit? For some of us, no matter how much pain we put into eating healthy foods and exercising, there’s no gain. It’s virtually impossible to lose that muffin top and unmask those gorgeous, strong abs. You’re forced to just live with unwanted bulges or think surgery.
Which is not cool by us, and exactly why we now offer CoolSculpting® at Sheryl Clark MD Dermatology and Dermatologic Surgery.
Here’s the skinny: developed by Harvard scientist Rox Anderson, this unique, patented, clinically proven procedure involves freezing fat cells without damaging your skin. There’s no knife. No suction hoses. No needles. No lasers, even. After your treatment, you get on with your busy day.
On average, you’ll see a 20 to 25% reduction of fat in the treated area after one visit. You can lose even more with additional appointments, if you and your doctor deem necessary. What does that mean? Simply put, your clothes fit better. You look better. The fat cells are naturally eliminated from your body over the following few months, leaving you feeling more like yourself again. The fat cells and their contents are cleared naturally by a process called apoptosis, which means the macrophages, the little Pac-men of the body, take them away without ever dumping fat into the circulation, unlike liposuction and other techniques of fat removal. It’s totally non-invasive, FDA-cleared, and there’s usually no downtime whatsoever — unless you count reading a book or checking email during your appointment as downtime. How cool is that? And what’s more is there are no pills or supplements and as long as you maintain your weight with normal diet and exercise, your long-term results should remain stable. In fact if you slip and put weight on again, since there are fewer cells now in the treated area, you should not add as much fat to the area(s) you've treated as to the rest of you.
CoolSculpting
How Does CoolSculpting Work?
Popsicle panniculitis is a dermatologic condition applied to the phenomenon of atrophy of fat of the cheeks of young children who suck on popsicles. The observation that exposure to low temperatures in certain circumstances vselectively damages subcutaneous fat while leaving skin intact led to the development of a device, the CoolSculpting device by Zeltiq, that would achieve the same results in areas where fat reduction is desired. Based on the physical fact that fat has a higher freezing point than water, and therefore that fat cells are more easily damaged by cooling than skin cells, cryolipolysis was developed to apply low temperatures to tissue via thermal conduction in such a way that fat would be damaged without damage to the overlying skin.
Cryolipolysis, popularly known as CoolSculpting, is a medical procedure in which adipocytes, or fat cells, are eliminated from subcutaneous tissue. Its success relies on controlled cooling for non-invasive local reduction of fat deposits to reshape body contours. The exposure to cooling is set so that it causes cell death of fat cells without damage to the overlying skin. The procedure is a nonsurgical alternative to liposuction. In order to avoid frostbite, a specific temperature level and exposure is determined. Physicians Dieter Manstein, MD, PhD and R. Rox Anderson, MD at The Wellman Center at Massachusetts General Hospital originated the concept, explored it in a number of experiments on pigs, and reported their data in 2008. While the process is not fully understood, it appears that fatty tissue that is cooled below body temperature but above freezing undergoes localized cell death followed by a local inflammatory response, that gradually over the course of several months results in a reduction of the fatty tissue layer. When exposed to extreme cold, the body's usual response is to restrict circulation to keep the core of the body at the correct temperature. Cryolipolysis makes use of a powerful vacuum which adds to the inflammatory response by drawing blood up to the surface layers of the skin.
Some patients ask, how is it that freezing fat for later injection in the skin, as we do for fat augmentation of the face, for example, does not kill fat cells whereas cryolipolysis results in the death of fat cells? And how is cryolipolysis different from frostbite? For more information, please see my answers to CoolSculpting questions on Real Self at http://www.realself.com/find/New-York/New-York-City/Dermatologist/Sheryl-Clark#qa or view our before and after photos!
5 Reasons to see Dr. Sheryl Clark for CoolSculpting:
1. Dr. Clark is a board-certified academic dermatologist. She will personally evaulate you during your free cosmetic consultation and provide you with a body fat and muscle analysis.
2. She has trained in and is skilled in the art of true sculpting, as opposed to bulk reduction, of fat. This is an advanced approach to CoolSculpting that helps achieve a more sculpted look. She will personally evaluate you and mark where applicators should be placed and which ones of the many applicators should be used. It is critical that your body fat be truly sculpted so that your result is elimination of fat where it is most prominent, with no irregularities or dymetr.
3. Dr. Clark is one of the most experienced providers of CoolSculpting. She was chosen by Zeltiq to be one of the group of 10 physicians to launch the procedure in NYC after it received FDA approval in 2010.
4. Dr. Clark's practice is CoolScultping Certified by Zeltiq, which means that she and her staff have undergone advanced training. We have been to CoolSculpting University.
5. Dr. Clark employs ALL of the CoolSculpting applicators, including those that for the first time allow treatments to take place in just 35 minutes!
6. Dr. Clark will evaluate your body fat and muscle composition, and how your fat is distributed on your body. When appropriate, she will recommend specific probiotics and supplements that assist in weight loss and improve health. She will also discuss diet, exercise, and stressors, all of which affect not only total body weight but where fat is deposited on the body as well as the health of the gut, brain, and immune system. So while there are reducing localized deposits of fat that are troublesome, her patients also getting healthier!
7. If you are not an appropriate candidate for CoolSculpting, she will discuss other options with you and refer you to another specialist if indicated. She really cares about what is best for you.