Secret PRO: RF microneedling and resurfacing

Microneedling with radiofrequency drives fine needles to a set depth and delivers energy from the needle tips into the dermis. The controlled injury and heat prompt a wound-healing response, and the collagen laid down over the following months is what produces the change.

Fractional resurfacing treats the surface instead, creating microscopic columns of treated tissue separated by untreated skin. The untreated skin between the columns is what allows healing to happen relatively quickly.

Used together, the two address different layers in one appointment: texture and tone at the surface, firmness and scarring deeper down. Depth and energy are set for the area and for your skin, which is why this is a clinical treatment rather than a menu item.

What it improves, realistically, is skin texture, the appearance of acne scarring, enlarged pores and mild laxity. It is not a substitute for surgery where there is significant sagging, and it will not remove deep static lines on its own.

Any treatment that creates controlled injury can trigger post-inflammatory hyperpigmentation, where the healing skin produces excess pigment. Richer skin tones carry a higher risk of this, and so does recently sun-exposed skin of any tone.

In practice, that means settings are adjusted for your skin, treatment is sometimes preceded by weeks of preparation with prescribed topicals, and it is often deliberately scheduled for the months when your sun exposure will be lowest.

Anyone who offers you an identical protocol regardless of skin tone or recent sun exposure is not assessing you. The question is not whether the device works on your skin; it is what settings and what preparation your skin needs, and sometimes whether a gentler approach is the better route to the same place.

Melasma deserves a specific mention, because it behaves differently from other pigmentation and can be worsened by heat as well as by light. Where melasma is present, the plan is built around that first.

Keep the skin clean and moisturised as instructed, do not pick at flaking, avoid heat and heavy exercise for the period we give you, and stay out of direct sun completely while the skin is healing.

After that, daily broad-spectrum sunscreen is not a suggestion. In this climate, ultraviolet exposure on freshly treated skin is the single most reliable way to convert a good result into a pigmentation problem that takes months to settle.

Call us if you develop increasing pain, spreading redness, blistering beyond what we described, or anything that looks like infection. Those are uncommon, and they are treatable when reported early.