Has a bad tattoo gotten under your skin?

Tattoo removal creams are the newest development in tattoo removal and are available to people looking for alternatives to laser and surgical methods. They are usually sold as a series of creams designed to lighten pigment and exfoliate your skin. With time, the tattoo gradually becomes lighter, and thus fades away.

However, many are of the opinion that although tattoo removal creams may fade a tattoo most of them won’t remove a tattoo completely. The tattoo will likely remain visible and skin irritation and other reactions are possible. Remember, typical tattoo ink is made from insoluble pigments that were designed for permanency.

Some people may choose to combine topical creams with laser tattoo removal (currently the most widely used tattoo removal technique). Done this way, you may be able to lighten a tattoo prior to any laser treatments. This may lessen the number of required laser treatments and therefore your cost. It may also help you avoid scaring that may occur from some types of repeated laser sessions.

Fading your tattoo, prior to laser therapy, may also help diminish certain pigments that lasers have difficulty targeting such as yellow, green, light blue and light orange. Ironically, the darkest pigments: blue, black and red are the easiest for modern lasers to remove. Some of these cream manufacturers claim that their product works fastest on lighter tones and age does not seem to matter.

One of the main ingredients in many of these creams is hydroquinone, a skin bleaching agent. If not used carefully, it can irritate skin and in extreme cases lead to scarring. In lab tests hydroquinone has been shown to cause leukemia in mice and other animals. The European Union (27 countries) banned it from cosmetics in 2001. It is sold in most pharmacies in the United States but not in concentrations exceeding 2% without a prescription. It is available in 4% strength in Canada.

Companies that market hydroquinone-based skin bleaching products claim that, in most cases, some skin lightening should be apparent after 4 weeks of use though it may take up to 8 – 12 weeks. They often recommend discontinuing use if no lightening effect is noticed after 3 months of continuous use.

Other tattoo removal cream ingredients are often an exfoliator (mild dermabrasive), a UV block to prevent sun damage and vitamins like E and A. They are usually designed without acid (unlike tca tattoo peel chemical peel), claim to be non-abrasive and won’t permeate below the top layer of skin, your epidermis.

Although they’re the most inexpensive way to do it yourself, many of these companies offer no meaningful guarantee that their creams will completely remove a tattoo. However, you won’t find an unconditional guarantee from any laser treatment providers either. It is important to know that more than 100 different tattoo inks are in use worldwide and none of them are regulated by the FDA. Not knowing which ink was used or its depth makes it impossible to predict the success of removal.

Although they are often marketed as painless, more convenient and affordable they still require a commitment of time, patience and money.

Be wary of any online tattoo organization or ‘institute’ that claims to have carried out independent research on various tattoo removal creams. They can often be proven as fake sites designed for no other purpose than to prove a certain product (theirs) is the best, pain free, cheaper than laser, no skin damage etc. Sites like these are most likely owned by a product manufacturer.

In the past, dermabrasion, cryosurgery, and excision were the most common methods of tattoo removal now they are hardly ever used. Today, the most popular tattoo fading methods fall into three categories: laser tattoo removal, tca tattoo peeling solutions and tattoo fade creams.

More and more people are searching the internet for ‘fade tattoo‘ or ‘tattoo fading‘ solutions. If you really need your tattoo removed and can’t afford surgery or ipl tattoo removal it probably wouldn’t hurt to try out one of these creams. They’re not inexpensive, but definitely cheaper than laser tattoo removal.

One other thing, beware of any before and after pics where the angle and distance of the picture are identical even though the pictures claim to be taken over 1, 3, 6 months etc, they’re just photo-shopped images.