Whether you’ve had them since puberty or they developed more recently because of weight gain or pregnancy, stretch marks can make you feel self-conscious about the appearance of your skin. Luckily, you don’t have to live with them as they are.
At Cosmetico MedSpa in Highland, Indiana, and Orland Park, Illinois, board-certified physician Dr. Nidal Hasan and our team are pleased to offer a full scope of skin rejuvenation services to meet every aesthetic skin care need — including stretch mark reduction with microneedling.
Here, we discuss why stretch marks develop, and explain how a series of easy microneedling treatments can help you restore smoother, firmer, healthier skin in no time.
Stretch marks (striae) are a type of harmless epidermal scarring that emerges after skin tissue rapidly expands or shrinks. While they’re often thought of as an unwanted cosmetic side effect of pregnancy — up to 90% of pregnant women get them — anyone can develop stretch marks, including growing teens and bodybuilding men.
Most stretch marks happen when skin tissues quickly stretch and/or shrink, usually because of growth, increasing weight, or rapid weight loss. Adolescent growth spurts, pregnancy, weight fluctuations, and intensive muscle building can all lead to the appearance of stretch marks.
Your skin is made of two main protein building blocks: collagen and elastin. Collagen gives your skin its structure and strength, while elastin gives your skin its resilience and laxity — or allows it to stretch. When your skin stretches quickly, its elastin fibers break and cause stretch marks.
Stretch marks vary in appearance depending on your skin tone, where they’re located, and what caused them. Most appear as indented streaks or lines that seem slightly sunken; they may be the same shade as your skin, or they may be discolored (i.e., pink, red, blue, brown).
Fresh stretch marks tend to be brighter, gradually fading to a lighter color over time; some stretch marks gradually become glossy and tighter, appearing as though they’re streaked with silver or white. They can also be itchy and mildly irritating.
While the scar-like lines that form stretch marks can appear on any area of skin, they’re most common on the abdomen, breasts, upper arms, lower back, hips, buttocks, and thighs.
Stretch marks can be difficult to treat, especially when they’re older and deeper. But even if newer, milder stretch marks are more responsive to treatment, microneedling is still one of the best methods for minimizing the appearance of any stretch mark.
Microneedling — also known as collagen induction therapy — is an innovative skin renewal technique that harnesses the power of your skin’s reparative mechanisms to revitalize your epidermal tissues from the ground up.
Using a special, pen-like device fitted with tiny, sterile needles, microneedling creates uniform “microchannels” across your skin. These tiny superficial wounds prompt a cascade of natural healing responses within your epidermis, including a super-charged influx of fresh collagen and elastin proteins.
The fine needles of the microneedling device make painless, miniscule perforations in your stretch marks, gently releasing some of the scar-like tissue strands that maintain these tight, indented streaks.
In the days and weeks after your treatment, as your skin ramps up its production of fresh collagen and elastin, the treated area becomes gradually smoother, firmer, and more uniform. It happens in three phases:
When the microneedling device pierces your skin, the “trauma” prompts your immune system to flood the area with increased blood flow and healing growth factors — laying the foundation for new tissue creation.
The tiny micro-wounds use the incoming cells to start rebuilding themselves; your skin starts producing “temporary” collagen and elastin, as well as a new network of blood vessels, as the repair process kicks into high gear.
Finally, your skin gradually replaces the temporary collagen and elastin with stronger versions of these same protein building blocks, tightening and smoothing the epidermal layer from the inside out.
Stretch marks disrupt the natural production of collagen and elastin in the skin area they affect. Microneedling not only helps restart that production but prompts an overproduction of these key skin proteins that help heal the damaged connective tissue in the dermis that created the stretch mark in the first place.
The size and nature of your unwanted stretch marks determine the number of microneedling treatments you require. The average microneedling session takes 30 minutes; many stretch marks require 3-6 treatments over the span of 4-6 months to achieve optimal skin-clearing results.
To improve the appearance of unwanted stretch marks, call or click here to schedule a visit at Cosmetico MedSpa in Highland, Indiana, or Orland Park, Illinois, today.
