Dr Cat’s July Update

by Vicky Lourens | Jul 2, 2024 | Dr Cat

We have only been in the new Quay St clinic for a few weeks, but the team have settled in beautifully and it’s a fabulous new space! If you haven’t been in yet, I’d highly recommend making an appointment just so you can check it out 😹. It still needs some art on the walls and our team’s certificates hung in their rooms, but our team has worked so incredibly hard to move out of our old Britomart Clinic and to create a place of relaxation and beauty in this new space, which is so light and spacious. They are loving it – especially the views of the water – and I am so incredibly proud of them and what they have created.

If you came into either of the clinics last Tuesday you might have seen some very glamorous-looking team members around the clinic. We had a super fun photo shoot for the team at the new clinic last week, with each of the team getting glammed up by hair and makeup artists (including my favourite @ranishortland_makeup artist) before having their new headshots taken by the always wonderful @kennedynz. Our Takapuna team took turns at coming over for their photos, so they were glammed up too. Sadly we couldn’t have the whole team in one place for a group photo, but we got some great shots of the new clinic that you’ll be starting to see come up on social media. If you haven’t checked it out yet, follow @thefaceplacenz on IG 🤩

I talked last month about how we were bringing new technologies into the clinic with the Emsella Chair and Exion RF needling. We are delighted that they are now available to be booked in the Quay St clinic, so ask your clinician if they might be appropriate for you, or book an appointment for a consultation.

As a reminder, the Emsella is an innovative chair that can improve your pelvic floor by stimulating over 11,000 kegels in 28 minutes, all with your clothes on! Both men and women experience benefits from this treatment with improved sexual enjoyment and function, as well as a reduction in incontinence from a leaky bladder. It also works really well alongside our other sexual rejuvenation treatments such as O-Shot, P-Shot and ThermiVa. If you have any metal implants in the pelvis, or mesh repairs, then sadly this treatment is not for you.

Where Emsella is focused on pelvic function, Exion has a range of treatments available on its platform, from AI-controlled RF needling to help improve skin texture to the simultaneous RF and ultrasound, which studies show can increase hyaluronic acid in the skin by 223%, improving the plumpness and ‘glow’ of the skin. Research presented at the recent ASAPS Non-Surgical Symposium in the Gold Coast showed that treatment with the RF-USS showed a 94.4% improvement in skin quality, 41% improved skin texture and 23% more skin hydration. There is also a ‘Body’ hand piece that can be used for fat reduction… more on that next month!

I attended ASAPS NSS with Lauren, Eve and Marilou, and it was an excellent conference. It was so lovely to be working alongside the rest of the team, each of us choosing the sessions we wanted to attend, and then catching up afterwards and comparing notes!

In addition to exploring the new research on the Exion, I also got to trial the new EmFace Submental applicator – designed for enhancing the chin and jawline. The Submental applicator not only uses HIFES to stimulate the digastric muscles to tighten the under chin area, the simultaneous radiofrequency in the treatment pad heats the tissues slightly higher than it does on the cheeks, to the temperature that stimulates apoptosis (death of) the fat cells in this area. This means the EmFace Submental helps to both tighten the pouchy neck and define the chin and jawline.

It feels a bit like someone is taking the muscle just under your chin and twisting it, but to be honest, I don’t mind the sensation 😹 You can have either the submental applicator and cheek applicator on at the same time (like I chose to) or the submental applicator and forehead applicator on at the same time, but if you want all 3 treatments in one session you have to do another 20 minute session that day as the machine can only supply 2 applicators at a time.

One of the stand out sessions for the injecting team at ASAPS NSS was the Profhilo workshop showcasing Profhilo around the mouth and in some other interesting areas. We will be trialling these techniques at our upcoming team training day before deciding whether we offer them for patients, but they are promising. There’s also an exciting new Profhilo product being launched in August called Profhilo Structura. I was introduced to this on my Profhilo ‘Train The Trainer’ trip to Dubai recently, so am super excited to see it soon being available in NZ.

Our team is now fully trained up on Viscoderm Hydrobooster – the unique filling product made by the same company as Profhilo – which can soften the dynamic (created by movement) and early static lines (the lines that stay), as well as being used in the rest of the skin of the face as a skin booster to improve plumpness, collagen and elastin. A syringe goes a REALLY long way! I see this being an excellent product for those pesky forehead lines in people who Botox drops their brows, or who want to retain movement in their forehead, and to fill the lines around the mouth without the skin getting ‘bulky’ from too much filler. It has also been shown to synergistically work with Profhilo to create even more hydration, plumpness and collagen, so we have a fun new package which combines Profhilo and Viscoderm Hydrobooster. The team is currently trying to come up with an appropriate name for it!

We have our team training day coming up, which is where the team gets together for a day to play with new techniques and products on our team members, so we can get honest feedback and also see what impact – good or bad – the new treatments have. One of our product core values is that we won’t use anything on you that we haven’t trialled on ourselves! We have quite a list of things to trial this Team Training Day, both from the ASAPS NSS conference, other trainings the team have attended, and our recent Vampire Academy, which Tina and Janny attended to learn the Vampire Facial, Vampire Facelift, Vampire Breastlift, O- Shot and P- Shot. They both did a wonderful job of injecting, alongside our external attendees. Marjorie did a fabulous job of organising the academy and assisting me for the 2 day workshop, and once again we scored 10/10 from every attendee on the feedback rating. Congratulations Marj, Janny and Tina, it was a highly successful weekend! For injectors who are interested, we have another Vampire Academy coming up in October.

It’s been a big month of training since I’ve been back, as I also facilitated some training for Allergan (the makers of Botox and Juvederm) on Monday, for about 20+ injectors ranging in experience from less than a year to over 14 years. The training was focused on the importance on consultation and assessment, which are topics dear to my heart, and it is always such an honour to influence others in the industry as part of their learning journey.

We are also trialling quite a few different products in the background, to see if they offer enough benefit for us to consider offering them. They have fulfilled our product values of safe, simple, effective, naturally based and medically proven – now we are doing the trials to determine if they are high reward/low drama and good value for money. We trial the treatments across different types of people and when assessing the results we consider whether it gives different or better results to what we already offer, before we consider providing it in clinic. We often get asked why we don’t provide ‘ X’ in clinic, and usually it’s because we have trialed it and it hasn’t fulfilled our stringent criteria.

While at ASAPS NSS in the Gold Coast, I had the second of my 50th birthday celebrations – a gorgeous lunch with a small group of close friends who have moved to the GC over the years. I feel so incredibly blessed as I’ve been friends with each of them for between 15 and 25 years! I’m so grateful to have lived to my 50th year, to have an incredible team (who moved everything to our new clinic while I was in a different country), and to have wonderful patients and a business that positively changes people’s lives.

Thank you, as always, for your support of me and our amazing team,

With love and hugs,

Dr Cat 😻