It’s natural to sweat when we’re hot, have just physically exerted ourselves or are about to conquer a fear like public speaking. If you’re one of the nearly eight million people who suffer from hyperhidrosis or excessive sweating, you know how debilitating the condition can be. You don’t have to suffer any longer. Call Laser Skin Solutions Jacksonville, in Jacksonville Beach, FL and ask about miraDry.
What Causes Sweat?
Sweat is something our bodies produce to regulate our temperature and keep us from overheating. When your body produces sweat when you’re hot, the sweat on your skin gets cooled from the air around it, and that cooling prevents you from overheating. That sweat is triggered by a nerve impulse from our brains telling our sweat glands to go to work.
We each have over three million sweat glands located all over our bodies. There are two kinds of these glands, each producing different kinds of sweat.
Eccrine Sweat Glands
These are the most abundant glands located on your body, and they open directly onto the skin. These glands produce a lightweight and odorless sweat made up of mostly water and salt. This is the sweat that forms on your back, arms, and legs when you work out.
Apocrine Sweat Glands
These glands are concentrated in the hair follicles and produce a heavier sweat that is laden with fat. The sweat produced from these glands begins odorless, but when it mixes with the bacteria found on your skin, it produces odor. These glands are found on the hair follicles of the:
- Scalp
- Groin
- Armpits
What Are the Triggers of Sweat?
There are triggers that will cause most of us to produce a normal amount of sweat. Each of us reacts differently, so how heavily we sweat varies slightly, but all within a normal range, called hidrosis.
Heat
This is why sweat exists: to cool us off when we are overheated. The process known as thermoregulation works because of evaporation. The process of evaporation is turning a liquid into a gas. Your body uses the air around you and your body’s heat to cause the evaporation of your sweat and the cooling of your body temperature.
If you’ve ever sweat on a humid day, you know the cooling down process isn’t as easy. This is because the swirling air around you is heavy with moisture, making evaporation difficult or impossible. Under normal heat conditions, the average person will sweat 1.5 liters of liquid every hour, making it critically important to hydrate when you sweat.
Exercise
Your body heats up quickly when you exercise, so thermoregulation kicks into high gear. That body heat needs to escape or we’ll overheat quickly. If you’re exercising outside and it’s hot, you can sweat up to a gallon every hour. Taking a break to hydrate isn’t just a good idea; it’s critical to stay healthy.
Fight or Flight
When you become extremely angry, anxious or stressed, your body triggers something called a fight-or-flight response. For pre-historic man, this got our bodies ready for a life-threatening situation. Our bodies release hormones, our heart rate quickens, our breathing becomes deeper and we sweat.
Today, this response happens when we’re anxious about something like speaking in public, there’s a perceived physical threat or we’re startled. The best way to ease this kind of sweating is to breathe deeply and wait for the triggered response to subside.
Fever and Sickness
When you have a fever, your body’s core temperature rises, sometimes dangerously. A fever is your body’s way of fighting off whatever is making it sick. You may sweat as your body simultaneously tries to cool itself. If you’re sweating everywhere and often, you should consult your doctor to rule out an underlying issue.
Hormones
Women who are approaching menopause may find they have night sweats. These are considered to be a normal symptom of the fluctuations in hormones they experience. They may go from very hot to chilled in a matter of moments.
Hyperhidrosis
If hidrosis is sweating normally, hyperhidrosis is the production of excessive sweat. This condition normally affects the feet, underarms and hands. Problems with excessive sweating under the arms usually start in late adolescence. There are hallmark symptoms of hyperhidrosis:
- Sweating every waking hour but not at night
- Sweating regardless of temperature or activity
- Sweating regardless of mood
- Constant dampness under the arms
- Using over the counter antiperspirants to no avail
If you find you choose clothing that will hide sweating, like baggy or dark clothes, and are constantly embarrassed by excessive sweating, you may be suffering from hyperhidrosis.
Psychological Effects
It’s not just the physical feeling and visibility of sweat that makes this a difficult condition to live with. The psychological effects of worrying about the appearance and odor of underarm sweat can influence someone’s quality of life. People with hyperhidrosis may deal with these emotional symptoms:
- Constant anxiety about odor and appearance
- Embarrassment
- Withdrawal from social activities
- Reluctance to draw attention to themselves at work
- Isolation
- Depression and/or anxiety
What Causes Hyperhidrosis?
The causes of hyperhidrosis aren’t well understood. There seems to be a genetic component to the condition. Most people suffering from this condition have at least one parent or sibling who also has hyperhidrosis.
Treatment
Luckily, there is hope! What used to seem like a hopeless condition that needs to be worked around through clever clothing choices and sweat management throughout the day can now be effectively treated with Miradry.
What Is MiraDry?
This is a non-invasive, in-office treatment to noticeably and dramatically reduce underarm sweating. This FDA-approved technique delivers long-lasting results. It doesn’t just eliminate sweat and odor glands: it reduces the growth of underarm hair. This further reduces sweat.
Is It a Laser?
No. MiraDry uses controlled, thermal, electromagnetic energy to destroy targeted sweat glands. This targeted energy bypasses the top layer of your skin, leaving it unharmed, to seek out sweat glands and abolish them. Once these glands are gone, they can’t come back.
While it’s true that we need our sweat glands, only about 2% of them are under our arms, so we won’t miss them, and our temperature will still be normally regulated. Some of the benefits of this treatment include:
- Odor control
- Underarm hair reduction
- A non-invasive process
- Little to no downtime
- A safe, FDA-cleared treatment
- Fast appointment times
- Lasting results
What to Expect
When you and your skincare specialist have decided this is the right treatment for your excessive underarm sweating, the only preparation you have to do is to shave four to six days before your session.
Treatment
When you arrive for your appointment, a local anesthetic will be applied to the treatment area to ensure you’re comfortable throughout the process. Your underarm will be marked for treatment to ensure the energy is correctly targeted for optimal results. The handheld device will be placed on your skin, delivering electromagnetic energy to the sweat glands.
As the energy is delivered, it heats and destroys the sweat glands without harming your skin. Most clients report they only feel suction and no discomfort. The entire appointment lasts about one hour. It takes about 20 minutes to numb the skin and 20 minutes for each side of the body.
After Treatment
This treatment requires no downtime and most clients go right back to their normal daily routines immediately after their appointment. You can resume exercising a few days after treatment.
Results
The results are almost immediate, and they last. Once sweat glands are destroyed, they cannot grow back. People report an average of an 82% reduction in armpit sweat. Some clients will get the results they want after just one treatment, while others may opt for up to three treatments spaced three months apart.
These long-lasting results differ greatly from those you can get from using neuromodulators under the arm. Those treatments only last about six months because they only halt sweat production; they don’t permanently address it. The hair follicles that are destroyed during this process won’t grow back either.
Laser Hair Removal
If the thought of thinning out your underarm hair while treating excessive underarm sweating is appealing, consider laser hair removal for other unwanted hair. That laser hair removal system that uses the most innovative technology is called Excel HR.
What Is Excel HR?
Excel HR is a dual laser hair removal system that gets superior results and provides maximum client comfort. To target the hair follicle, this system uses two laser pulse speeds combined with a built-in cooling system to keep the surface of the skin cool and comfortable. Cooling is delivered before, during and after the application of the pulsed laser to ensure total comfort.
Lasers work by targeting the pigment of the hair, traveling down the hair shaft and gently heating the follicle walls under the skin. When these walls are destroyed, the hair follicle can’t grow back. This system is easily adjusted to address both small and large areas.
Results
All results vary among clients. Keep in mind that your hair is in different phases of growth at all times. Because this treatment targets pigment that travels all the way to the follicle, it will only work on actively growing hair. It takes a few weeks for the targeted hair to loosen and fall out, but once it sheds off your skin, it’s gone.
Some people will have a bit of hair regrowth no matter what the hair removal method. If this happens, the hair grows back finer and less concentrated.
How Many Treatments Will I Need?
Each client is different. Because your hair is in different phases of growth, more than one session is needed to catch more hair in the growth phase. There are four stages of growth, so to ensure you target the most hairs in the active phase, you may opt for four or more treatments. If you want completely smooth results, you may need 6-9 treatments spaced 6 to 10 weeks apart.
The number of treatments needed depends on the area being treated, the amount and condition of the hair being removed and your body’s responsiveness to treatment.
Who Is a Good Candidate?
The best results will happen for people with medium to dark hair. The light from the laser targets the melanin that causes pigment. Light-colored or grey hair has very little melanin, and clients with hair of these colors will not get the results they want from this treatment. This laser system is great for all skin types, so as long as you also have dark hair, this will work for you!
Call for Your Life-Changing Appointment
Living with the constant anxiety of excessive sweating doesn’t have to be your norm. Call Laser Skin Solutions Jacksonville in Jacksonville Beach, FL for your consultation. Our compassionate staff is dedicated to providing you with the best service and results so you can stop worrying about sweat and start enjoying your life. We look forward to talking with you soon!
