How many sessions will I need?
The number of sessions you will need to achieve complete hair reduction depends on your body: hair density and type, as well as your skin type. Also it may depend on some other conditions such as medication, illness history, etc.
Hair grows in a cycle (find out more here)), this means that any one time your skin has follicles which are actively growing hair, are resting or are in a transitional phase. IPL treatment is only effective when the hair is in the growing phase (anagen phase). This means that no depilation treatment is able to stop all hair growth at any one single point of time. On a typical area, there are thousands of hair follicles, a proportion of these will not be active and become active after the treatment. This means 6 to 8 sessions (spread on average over a year to a year and a half) may be necessary to achieve permanent hair reduction.
Remember: you are unique, everyone has different combinations of hair type and density, so all of the numbers here are for orientation only and many vary between individuals. Our practitioners will be able to advise and plan out a treatment plan specifically for you and based on the results of the treatment.
Initial Session
Your initial IPL treatment will target many of the hairs which are currently growing. In the days or sometimes weeks after the first treatment, most of the hairs which were growing will fall out, while the rest will keep growing as usual. From the first session on, you will see reduced hair-growth.
Consecutive Sessions
New hairs will continue to appear after the initial session. The hairs that were in the resting phase in the previous session will now be in the growing phase. That is why you will need further follow-up sessions. During the consecutive sessions, the same process will apply, IPL will target the hairs which are in the growing phase and eliminate them.
The entire treatment length depends on your specific body characteristics. If you have high hair density in the treated area, you are more likely to have more hairs follicles which will require more sessions. Also if you have a very slow hair growth life cycle, you are more likely to have more hairs follicles which were not affected by the first sessions.
Our practitioners will be able to advise on the best timing for consecutive treatments based on the results so far.
Another factor is your hair growth rate, which differs from area to area. In addition, each treatment weakens the hair follicles, any continuing hair growth is a lot slower and the hair produced is finer and weaker. This means that sessions normally need to be spaced further and further apart over time.
We recommend a successive session every 20 to 30 days for facial areas and between one month to two months for body areas.
After an average of 6 to 8 sessions, the number of active hair follicles you will have in the treated area will be massively reduced and you will see much reduced hair-growth.