Dr. Hu ReNew360 Tips: Kybella

Hello, everyone! This week’s topic is “how to get rid of unwanted fat under the chin”.  I have many patients who are troubled by the fullness under the chin.

A 2015 consumer survey done by American society of Dermatologic surgery found that 67% of individuals are bothered by excess fat under the chin. In the past, the liposuction is the only effective method to decrease the fat. Now, we have three proven noninvasive methods: 1. Kybella injection, 2. NuEra radiofrequency treatment, 3. CoolSculpting treatment.

Here I will concentrate on Kybella and NuEra, and how to get a great result by combining both of the treatment.

• Kybella is a nonsurgical injectable technique used to target the fat beneath the chin. 
• Its generic name is deoxycholic acid, which is one of the secondary bile acid.
• The primary bile acid chenodeoxycholic acid is metabolized by intestinal bacteria to deoxycholic acid. 
• In our body, deoxycholic acid is used in the emulsification of fats for absorption in the intestine. It functions like a detergent, dissolving fat. 
• In the United states, it is approved on April 29 2015 by FDA for reducing moderate-to-severe fat beneath the chin. Since it is part of normal chemicals of our body, it has been a very safe treatment.
• In clinical trial, 82.4% of people reported significantly improvement and were satisfied with their appearance.

I have performed hundreds Kybella injections in the past few years with many happy patients. Please check out the videos of injection I just did last week on my Instagram. 

It is a quite simple procedure with very little risk for bruising. Each treatment takes about 10-15 minutes with 2 to 4 vials of kybella injected. Each vial is 2cc of deoxycholic acid. Most of patients require two up to five treatments depending on the excess volume. Each treatment is done every 6-8 weeks.

In the past year, I have combined the kybella injection with NuEra Radiofrequency treatment.  We noticed even better improvement after combining both treatments.  NuEra itself is used for decreasing the fatty tissue under the chin. The process is called Radiofrequency lipolysis.  The NuEra probe will contact the skin and deliver heat targeting fat cells without impacting other cells. Its penetration is about 1 cm and the temperature window for lipolysis is about 42-45 degrees. 

The other benefit for adding radiofrequency treatment together with Kybella injection is to achieve desired skin tightening. We all know that the radiofrequency can provide skin tightening by inducing the release of heat-shock protein which in turn stimulates our body to create new collagen. Heat shock protein 47 is considered to be the chaperone of collagen. The skin thus becomes tighter and younger after radiofrequency treatment. None of us would like to end up with loose skin after fat reduction procedure. 

So in summary, to decrease the under chin fat and tightening the skin, we can combine both Kybella injection with NuEra radiofrequency treatment.