Hey HairTell,
Just got back from my first consultation at a spot that carries the Apogee Elite lasers. They have the ones that is an Alexandrite as well as Nd:YAG laser (the MX?)
Anyway, my laser tech classified me as a skintype 4. I’m bordering 3 and 4, but she marked me as a type 4 because of how dark I tan in the summers (olive skintone). We did a test patch on both lasers (Alex and Nd:YAG), I felt the Alex part of the laser a lot more.
Anyway, I asked for the treatment parameters and they are as follows. Hopefully some of our resident laser specialists can chime in on whether or not these will be effective for me.
On my left pec, I was treated with YAG:
20 ms, 25 joules, 15mm spot size.
On my right pec, I was treated with the Alexandrite:
20 ms, 14 joules, 15mm spot size.
The treatment was like a little pinch, but I would have definitely been able to handle more. She insisted that these were perfect settings for me, but I honestly thought I could tolerate a lot more. From what I’ve seen with the system’s max settings on the Alexandrite wavelength (25 joules, 5ms, 15mm spot size), I thought my test patches were extremely low (isn’t the max on the YAG 40 joules, 15 mm spot size, and 5ms?). I don’t know if they will be willing to treat me at any higher settings.
Here is a picture of my chest for reference:
http://i.imgur.com/RfXWRPJh.jpg (pre treatment, this was taken last week.)
Should I push for higher settings next time? I don’t want these treatments to be ineffective, so I can always opt for complete clearance with electrolysis when I move back to school in the summer. I just figured I could knock out a ton of my hair with laser and save myself the grief.