Nuviderm’s TCA tattoo fading product is marketed as a simple-to-use, safe and effective home tattoo removal option.

The company claims that user’s of its product can save up to 60% of the cost of having their tattoo removed, how is this you ask?

Well they claim that since the cost of having a tattoo removed by laser can cost approximately 10x more than having it put on to begin with – pre-fading it (prior to undergoing laser sessions) will cut your costs that dramatically.

A TCA tattoo removal home fading kit may mean you’ll require fewer laser sessions. What this can also translates into is less-painful laser therapy. This is because the TCA tattoo peel will have a chance to pre-fade your ink using a controlled chemical inflammation. Less ink absorbs less pain-causing heat from the laser. An added bonus to Nuviderm (as well as many other sometimes cheaper TCA products) is a shorter recovery time after your laser tattoo removal or intense pulsed light tattoo removal sessions because the pre-faded ink is easier to remove.

As with other TCA peel products, Nuviderm’s chemical peel is not ‘color-selective’ that means it will work with equal effectiveness on all color pigments, the same cannot be said for tattoo laser treatment where a variety of wavelengths are required to target specific pigment colors.

Prices for these trichloroacetic acid tattoo removal peels can vary quite a bit depending on the size and strength of the concentration (20% to 30% strengths or quite common). As for how much of the peeling agent you will need a rough guide would be one ounce for a 3 x 3 tattoo, however, this is not based on science only from feedback from those who have used these sorts of products.

Other factors also need to be taken into consideration – such standard things as:

Your skin type
The age of the tattoo
The ink composition (since tattoo ink manufacturing is currently unregulated there is an unbelievable number of possible ingredients in tattoo ink like iron oxides, plastics, cinnabar, copper, titanium dioxide and carbon just to name a small fraction)
The depth of tattoo ink colors – it tends to ‘sink’ into the dermis over the years.
Whether or not you follow the product’s instructions – consistent use is often the key with these tattoo chemical peel products.

Many are priced from between $25 and $45 for .5oz to 1oz. As you can see, TCA tattoo peels are an affordable alternative by comparison to other tattoo removal techniques.

Once you begin treatment you should start to notice the borders beginning to soften, this may happen after just a few treatments. The truth about laser tattoo removal is, although they are considered very affective, they are very expensive and it usually takes a long time to get the results you want.

Some people are under the impression that the tattoo is magically zapped off in a single laser treatment, this is far from true. On average people need between 5 and 15! visits for laser removal. Multiple those numbers by the average cost per laser session (say a conservative $150.) and it gets really expensive.

If you’re serious about getting rid of a tattoo giving one of these TCA tattoo removal products a try is definitely worth a shot. If you have concerns about burning or scarring keep in mind that these peels have been used for over 50 years (and are still very popular) for things like removing wrinkles and lines from people’s faces.

There is occasionally a slight stinging sensation associated with TCA peels like Nuviderm but this can be relieved using a baking soda and water mixture which neutralizes the acid – these instructions are usually in the kit.