I see many homemade tattoos that patients received as students in high school. These tattoos generally use poor quality ink and are often put in with dull needles and lousy techniques that frequently cause scarring. Scarred skin tends to reveal itself after the ink is removed. It can also hold onto ink harder than healthy tissue. In the case study below, the patient had a homemade cross tattooed on her shoulder blade. Sometime later she had a cover up of a kitty put on by a professional. When she came to me to have PicoSure laser tattoo removal she asked if it mattered that there was another tattoo underneath. I explained that it did not; however, multiple layers of ink can affect the number of treatments required. If you look at her series of photographs during the removal process, you see how the cover up came off first which revealed the original cross design beneath. Once the cross was also removed, scarring from the crude tattooing process could also be seen.
While teenagers will never stop getting tattoos, we must encourage them that if they are going to do it anyway they should do it safely and in a professional shop with sterile needles and talented artists. If you have a crude tattoo from high school that you want cleared quickly and effectively using PicoSure laser tattoo removal, I can be reached by phone @ 512-479-9997 or just stop by my NEW location in Austin, TX: Austin Medspa on W. 6th St.
