A Cool Way To Lose Fat
By: Ray Doughty
Updated: September 16, 2010
Do you have a muffin top or some extra little bulges you want to reduce without surgery?
The FDA has approved the first device for non-invasive body sculpting.
Odilis Fernandez used to cover her midsection.
She's not hiding it anymore since having the procedure in May.
"I was not happy with my stomach and every time I went to the beach I would use a one piece because I had these bulky little pouches here," Fernandez said. "Big time difference. I can show my stomach now. I'm really happy with it."
Odilis didn't melt away her fat or get it suctioned out of her body.
Instead she gave it the cold treatment using the procedure called "Cool Sculpting".
The device has two cooling plates inside.
Suction holds it in place.
Each area has to be treated for an hour.
"During that hour it cools the fat to 43-44 degrees which kills the fat cells and nothing else," explains dermatologist Dr. Mark Nestor.
"It feels like a vacuum cleaner at first," says Fernandez. "Like a vacuum sucks in your skin., But it doesn't hurt. It's not painful."
The body's natural scavengers gobble up the dead fat cells, so the results are not instantaneous.
Fernandez says it was a month to six weeks before she saw results.
She fits the description of the perfect candidate for this procedure.
It's not for people who are very overweight.
"The ideal person for this is essentially reasonable weight but has pockets of fat whether it is the love handles, the area of the abdomen, on the back , by the knees, by the thighs" says Dr. Nestor.
Treatments are $800 for each area treated and usually patients need two to four areas treated at one sitting.
There's no downtime when you're done.
"Some patients may feel a little bit of numbness that may last about a month but we've had no issues whatsoever from the point of side effects or problems" says Dr. Nestor.
Fernandez says the results she got are more than she expected.
