Why scar fading?

• Reducing color makes a mark look smaller.
• Scar fading gives the appearance of a flatter scar.
• Facial fading treatments can ease embarrassment.
• Silicone is proven effective for fading.

The plastic surgeon tried to hide his handiwork. Your facial scar may be at the hairline. Or under the ear. If it heals red, or purple, or multi-colored, it becomes obvious.

Tummy tuck scars, and breast reduction or improvement scars can’t be hidden well. An effective scar fading cream can be part of “managing” those scars.

Also, you can’t know for a year to eighteen months just how much your plastic surgery mark will fade. That’s how long normal fading takes. Until then, people can see you “had work done”.

You can encourage plastic surgery scars to fade sooner with a silicone scar fading cream.

• Silicone was once used to moisturize scars. By accident doctors realized it shrinks tissue and fade redness.
• Of course, a shrunken scar is also less noticeable. Silicone works to reduce scar size.

Scar Treatments

1. 100% Silicone gel or cream.

• Keeps moisture around the wound. Speeds healing. Fast healing cuts scar formation.
• Silicone is an infection barrier. Infection stops normal healing, which means more scar tissue piles up.
• Silicone reduces scar color and size.
• It’s used by doctors following scar surgery.
• Doctors recommend it for home scar treatment.

2. Onion extract.

• This is an older, homeopathic remedy.
• It was tested at a Texas hospital.
• Redness, itching and scar size stayed the same.

3. Vitamin E.

• This was also part of the Texas hospital test.
• It proved worthless for scars.
• It could help your overall health.

4. Copper Peptide.

• It boosts collagen.
• Collagen is bad. It’s what makes scars bulge.
• It may be fine for indented scars.

5. Arnica.

• Homeopathic remedy.
• It easily breaks down if it comes in contact with any other substance.

6. Siegesbeckia orientalis.

• This is the juice of a sticky bush, used to cover wounds. So there is some protection.
• The Chinese think it’s a weed and avoid it. The Chinese KNOW herbal medicine.

7. Sorbitan olivate.

• Basically, it’s olive oil.
• It can soften skin.
• Oil di olivia makes no permanent change in scarring.

8. Elicina.

• This is snail extract.
• There is no medical evidence it works to reduce scars.

You will find scar products made of silicone mixed with aloe or other moisturizers. No over-the-counter moisturizer can do what silicone does to draw and retain moisture. These products contain less healing silicone to make room for the moisturizer.

Surgery activates more keloids. Silicone removal creams can’t.

• Cream does not break the skin. It does not awaken the tendency to form keloids. A silicone keloid scar removal cream encourages fibers to loosen. A keloid is a thick bunch of scar fiber.
• Cutting releases more thick tissue in the same place. There is a high rate of keloid recurrence – up to 50% – according to the medical review board of About.com. Doctors can’t predict which time surgery will work, or if it will boomerang.

Scalpel or laser?

• It doesn’t make any difference. A knife and a beam cut skin. The wound awakens the tendency to form severe scars.

When you heal abnormally once, chances are it will happen again somewhere else on your body. Silicone is the earliest possible home treatment when surgery is too risky.

Medical grade, 100% silicone is available in scar removal cream sold over the counter. The FDA has approved it. People prone to abnormal healing should start using it as soon as a break in the skin closes. In fact, some doctors prescribe it after surgery.

• Infection brings healing to a standstill.
• The longer a wound or incision takes to heal, the more scar tissue builds up.
• The body is just trying to hold the wound together when it grows scar tissue.
• It’s going to try harder when infection stops healing.

The Italian research documents the need for what they call “a mechanical barrier against bacteria.” What they mean by “mechanical” is something you apply.

A home scar treatment using 100% silicone creates this kind of protective barrier. It  guards against infection,  blocks air, dust and other irritants.

More from the doctors in Italy: “As shown by the most up-to-date research, it is now possible to accomplish the pharmacological and non-surgical therapy of…scars by means of … chemical agents.”

Medical-grade silicone is a pharmacological and non-surgical therapy.

Why avoid surgery? When they cut they have to do a lot more to prevent scarring. The most difficult thing to do affect blood flow to the scar tissue to slow its growth.

-Article Source: Cattedra di Chirurgia Plastica Parma, Italy.

• All of this started with a study of how well pressure prevents scarring.
• Until now, doctors treating burns have assumed they need to use pressure to prevent scars.
• And they know silicone helps reduce scarring.
• They put the two together. Silicone on pressure sheets helped.

So can a layer of silicone without the sheets.

This work was at a major Institute of Surgical Investigation. Doctors keep proving silicone reduces scarring. They still haven’t figured out why. Or why applying a layer of silicone can be as helpful as sheets when surgery is not an option.

Here is how the medical investigators put it: “Improvement has been observed in recent years by many researchers using silicone gel treatment in hypertrophic burn scars.  (Why it works) remains to be determined, but it is not due to pressure, temperature, oxygen tension…” – Journal of Plastic Reconstructive Surgery

It may be that it’s the protection of the silicone – not the pressure - that works on hypertrophic (raised) burn scars.  A layer blocks infection. It reduces irritation. Yes, a silicone sheet protects. And a flexible layer of silicone gel protects just as well. Plus it won’t come off when skin flexes.

Pressure is essential and silicone sheets are the standard after surgery for large burns. But for smaller wounds with smaller scars, a scar removal cream made with silicone can be enough. No pressure needed.

No matter who does the stitches, there will be a scar. It may be a tidy white line, a prominent red scar, or heaped-up scarring known as keloids. This is thick scar tissue growing far beyond the confines of the original wound. Scarring is the body’s natural response when healing. The best plastic surgeon in the world will leave a scar, and sloppy stitching can leave a jagged, protruding mark. It is possible to fade and shrink a stitches scar.

An antibiotic prescribed to prevent infection will minimize a stitches scar, because it promotes healing. Slow healing stimulates scar formation. Topical silicone has also been proven to promote healing, add moisture (essential to healing), and help flatten the scar. Silicone therapy can also alleviate redness and pain and is available in over-the-counter creams and gels. Of the more costly medical options, laser treatments are considered specific, that is, contained to the scar tissue. Dermabrasion can damage surrounding skin and may be limited to smaller scars. Minimizing a scar takes months and frequent medical sessions, or repeated applications of a scar cream.

Home remedies include swallowing flax seed oil and rubbing Vitamin E or cocoa oils directly on the stitches scar. Benefits have not been proven. Staying out of the sun does work. Scarred skin is extremely susceptible and will permanently darken when exposed to UV rays. Sunscreen is not advised on new stitches. A stitches scar should be protected from the sun.

What to do?

You can have additional scar “revision” surgery. There is dermabrasion (scraping scar tissue down), chemical peels and laser scar treatments. You may say, “around my tummy?” Many prefer to avoid these medical scar therapies because they would make scars more apparent for the many months of scar treatment.

Silicone scar creams and gels give you private tummy tuck scar treatment.

The advantage of a silicone scar gel is that it is invisible while it works. You avoid drawing more attention to a tummy tuck scar during treatment.

• Silicone scar treatment forms a protective layer which discourages infection from outside sources.
• In addition, the layer encourages retention of moisture.
• Moisture is essential to speeding healing, which reduces scarring.

They think, “Why admit it if I don’t have to?”

Plastic surgeons take pains to hide breast augmentation scars. But the fact is, any wound leaves a scar. In some people, breast augmentation scars can be redder, wider, or more heaped-up above the skin surface.

You can get started on scar treatment as soon as the breast augmentation wounds have healed.   Silicone cream is now commonly used after plastic surgery. Doctors in the UK routinely employ silicone scar therapy alongside various  scar treatments. Silicone scar treatment is often recommended as immediate therapy and continuing therapy.

Why Does Silicone Work as a Scar Treatment?

• Silicone helps cells retain moisture. Moisture always facilitates healing, which reduces scar size and color.
• Silicone in gel or cream form creates a layer of infection protection. Infection severely increases scar formation and preventing it is essential scar treatment.
• Silicone applied directly to a scar penetrates to deeper layers, where the cells are weaving into hard scar tissue.

Piercings have resulted in a jump in the number of serious keloid scars. The areas of the body most often pierced are most prone to keloids. This includes the earlobes, lips, nipples and navel.

Those most at risk of forming keloids are people younger than 30, and people with high risk trauma. They found men and women are at equal risk. Men now get pierced as frequently as women.  It used to be mostly women, so the rate was skewed female.

Research resulted in dramatic evidence that silicone gels work to reduce size and pain of serious scars such as piercing scars. It should be used immediately after a piercing scar is closed.

Silicone promotes healing:

• It decreased the size of scars in 53% of test patients.
• It reduced  tenderness in 36%.
• It stopped itching in 45%.

Piercing scar advice:

• It is best used as soon as a wound heals.
• It is best used at least twice a day.
• It must be used on serious piercing scars consistently for 3 to 6 months
• Research finds keloid scar reduction from silicone gels within 6 months.
• Silicone aids healing if used in conjunction with piercing scar removal by surgery or lasers.

• A keloid is  “scar tissue that won’t stop growing”. It is often not a candidate for surgical removal, or dermabrasion, because those treatments also leave a scar, and it may be a keloid.
• There is a real risk the skin that grows back after keloid scar removal will be bigger, bolder keloid tissue.

Keloids on dark skin appear pink or red.  They stand out on dark skin.

People of color are particularly in search of a keloid scar removal that fades the color of the out-of-control scar tissue.

With medical options discouraged by doctors, silicone keloid scar treatment makes sense for darker skin. Silicone promotes fading over time.

Research proves silicone reduces keloid scars.

A major medical center in India performed a controlled study of silicone scar treatment creams and gels. They concluded it may be the least expensive, effective option for poor third world countries. The research was done in India because dark South Asian skin is prone to keloids.