Want to know how much weight you can potentially lose with aesthetic treatments? Although it would be amazing if you could have cosmetic surgery to instantly remove excess pounds, the truth is that these procedures are for aesthetic contouring and don’t help you lose significant weight. In other words, weight loss strategies are not the same thing as “fat reduction” treatments like CoolSculpting®. Milwaukee, WI’s ReFresh Aesthetic Center explains that the popular and innovative fat loss treatment works in a different way from standard weight loss efforts.

Successful weight loss has numerous health benefits for people who are overweight, but spot reduction is not possible with typical diet and exercise. Our fat distribution is mostly determined by genetics, gender, hormones, and other lifestyle factors, so we don’t have much control over the way our body is shaped or where it “packs on” volume.

Targeting fat in isolated areas with freezing treatments allows people to sculpt their body so that clothes fit more comfortably, and muscles are better defined. CoolSculpting® is a “cryolipolysis” treatment that freezes and kills fat cells, which are then metabolized and flushed out of the body. It removes small pockets of fat, producing mild to moderate results: up to 20 or 25 percent reduction in volume, however, there is no significant change in health or overall body shape.

The ideal strategy for a patient depends on their goals. Why? There is a major difference between what happens to the fat cells in your body during lifestyle-based weight loss and after a CoolSculpting® treatment:

Weight Loss

Most people tend to lose or gain weight more easily in some areas than others. Regardless of where it happens, however, the fat cells don’t go anywhere when the number goes down on the scale. This is one of the reasons why it can be so challenging for people to not just lose weight, but to keep that weight off.

Weight loss involves fat cells losing some of their contents, leading them to shrink in size. Weight loss produces by-products such as carbon dioxide and water, which are eliminated from the body during breathing, urination, or sweating. As the cells become smaller, overall body shape changes—but the body maintains the same number of fat cells.

Unfortunately, it’s easy for the same fat cells to become enlarged again. Some studies also suggest that it becomes more difficult to lose subcutaneous—which is soft, below-the-skin fat—as we age.

CoolSculpting®

Cryolipolysis was “discovered” when scientists noticed that young children seemed to experience fat loss inside their cheeks after they sucked on popsicles. Coupled with a consideration of what happens to fat during frostbite, this led to studies into the mechanics of cold-induced fat death and resulted in the development of the revolutionary CoolSculpting® device.

During a treatment session, applicators specific in size to the treatment area cool fat cells at a specific temperature. This works because fat freezes at a higher temperature in comparison to the other tissues. The very low temperatures cause fat cells to crystalize and be marked for breakdown by natural processes, but other types of tissue—such as skin and muscle—aren’t destroyed by the temperatures, so they remain undamaged.

Although scientists admittedly don’t yet fully understand how the process fully works, the fat cells die several days after a treatment session. When the body clears out the dead cells, the volume in the treatment area is reduced. This makes the treatment ideal for someone who is already healthy and close to their ideal weight, but may be struggling with resistant areas of fat they can’t get rid of through diet or exercise.

It important to understand that CoolSculpting® can’t reduce visceral fat, which is the more unhealthy type of dense fat deep below the muscles in the belly that surround the internal organs. CoolSculptingâ treatments are only designed for reducing subcutaneous fat.

Learn more from ReFresh Aesthetic Center by calling 414-964-1111 or submitting a contact form to request a consultation and find out more about how non-surgical fat reduction can benefit you.