Beauty – Audrey's PIDP Blog

2018 has brought a year of change to the beauty industry. Specifically, the introduction and gaining popularity of more invasive treatments. Have you heard of microneedling? Chances are, in the Insta-driven world of beauty, you have. You may not understand what it means, but you have probably heard the term somewhere. Maybe you have even seen images depicting blood soaked, smiling faces.

Even Vogue is talking about these results driven treatments. Click here to access their February 23, 2016 online article by Jolene Edgar, featuring microneedling as the new fountain of youth.

https://www.vogue.com/article/microneedling-skin-care-next-big-thing

For a mainstream publication, this article does actually bring up factual and valid points regarding the history and safety of the procedure. I often find that a lot of articles found in fashion magazines do not, so this was a pleasant surprise. I dislike the image they chose to head the post though. It gives the reader an impression that is not accurate. Yes, much like they state in the article, large gauge needles were traditionally used. But they haven’t been for a couple of decades now, so why use that kind of image. Especially since there are so many more accurate images out there.

Needle Head — This is what a typical microneedling pen device looks like

As someone who has worked in this industry for 20 years, I have seen a lot changes. But nothing like the changes that have occurred over the past couple of years.

So what do you do if you are an Esthetician or Beauty Therapist, and your clients are coming in saying that they want these types of treatments? Of course you don’t want to turn them away, and you definitely don’t want them to get on the internet and order the at home version!

The demand for these types of treatments has created a huge shift in the world of beauty education. If you live in Canada, chances are there is no regulation in your field. That means it can become very confusing to choose a place to further your education, because there is also very little regulation when it comes to the continuing education offered to the industry.

Currently Health Canada is looking at some of the devices we have been using, and they will eventually create guidelines around the use of them. That could go either way for us. If you are an individual who has sunk a huge investment into these devices and your training, and built a business or clientele around it, it could be life changing to suddenly have these things taken from you.

So how do we decide what devices and treatments to go after?

I would say, in my experience, to look at the history of the treatment or device. This industry is cyclical. Everything comes back in one form or another. Ask yourself some honest questions:

Has this been around for many years?

What education should I seek to safely deliver the treatment?

Am I comfortable offering this type of service?

Will my insurance provider cover me for this treatment?

Is this device Health Canada approved?

If you are looking to see if a device or treatment has approval from Health Canada search here:

Medical Devices Active License Listing (MDALL)

https://health-products.canada.ca/mdall-limh/index-eng.jsp

Unfortunately, a lot of brands may mislead you, saying that they do have Health Canada approval, or that they have FDA approval (not actually recognized in Canada). You MUST do your own due diligence.

I do not mean to be doom and gloom over here. What I do recognize though, is that this industry is changing at a rate that is faster than the regulators behind it (if that) can keep up. Please do not fall into the trendy Insta-world of beauty. Some of these “educators” are simply looking to make a quick dollar. Do your research, it will serve you in the end.

As someone who is an educator in this field all of this growth and change have brought some challenges when it comes to delivering up to date information. Many devices cost thousands of dollars. The average professional, Health Canada approved microneedling pen is around $4,000 CAD just for the device, never mind the consumables you will need to continually purchase for it. The average laser platform will run you about $200,000 CAD, often more. So how do we, as an education facility afford to constantly upgrade and add devices? The quick answer is, we often can’t. This means that we need to make highly informed, good choices when it comes to purchasing equipment. I have to be more careful than ever when making these decisions. I look at quality, and what kind of continued manufacturer support is offered.

Remember how I brought up microneedling? I did that on purpose. I used that example because it is everywhere right now, under many a name. But you know what? It also has been around for decades. That’s what I mean about this industry being cyclical. There are the tried and true, and microneedling would be an example of that.