IPL Scarring: White stripes on face. Will this go away? (photos)

The striping you see are areas treated in the background of areas not treated leaving the appearance of striping.  Striping occurs when there are skip areas and is usually attributed to poor technique.  I would go back to whomever performed your procedure and let them evaluate you.  You will likely need another treatment and better technique and this will be corrected.  Best of luck!

Thank you for your question whitneypom. I am sorry to hear about your situation.
IPL is a great treatment for facial rejuvenation. When certain areas on the skin are treated with IPL and areas between them are missed it can lead to what is called striping. We use the Forever Young BBL IPL by Sciton which allows us to avoid this. This is because the laser has a large spot size and a fast repetition rate. So instead of doing a single pass with strong settings we perform 2 or more passes with conservative settings with slight overlap. This provides fast yet safe treatment without striping. Striping can be treated with this type of treatment. I recommend that my patients wait 4 weeks between treatments. Please consult with a doctor for specific recommendations. Good luck!

Hi there-- from those pictures, it looks like you have had an uneven IPL treatment resulting in striping. The skin that is not well treated remains dark and the lighter areas have cleared the pigment. This can happen especially when the skin is really too sun tanned to perform IPL. I probably would have recommended a series of VI peels to address the pigment first. Once the skin has improved you can then do IPL. You'll need either repeat IPL to treat the remaining areas or go back and do a VI peel now and then IPL if needed after that.

Thanks for the great question and I'm sorry you're upset. The areas of white skin are where you were treated with the IPL. Because IPL works so well, the pigment is totally gone in these areas. What is happening is that the untreated areas are outlining the treated areas because of the presence of pigment. You will not be left with permanent scarring, but will need additional treatments to even out your skin tone. Best of luck!~Dr. Sieber

Thank you for your question and for submitting your photos.  I'm sorry to hear that you are experiencing complications from your prior IPL treatment.  It's difficult to make an exact diagnosis without assessing you in-person, but based on your photos, you appear to be experiencing 'striping' rather than true scarring.  Striping occurs when IPL pulses are placed unevenly on the skin - essentially, the whiter areas are skin that has been fully treated with IPL, and the darker areas are untreated skin.  I would recommend following-up with the supervising physician at the clinic/spa where your treatment was performed.  You will likely need 1-2 additional IPL treatments to even out your treatment.  Best of luck!