INTRODUCTION
Collagen loss, age‐associated skin degeneration
SKIN LAXITY, HEAT
The dermis represents a skin supporting tissue with an extensive vascular network, neurons, smooth muscle fibers, and fibroblasts, and is mainly composed of collagen (mostly type I), elastin and glycosaminoglycans (GAGs), which are responsible for the resiliency of the skin, its density, tonicity, and elastic texture.Rhytids (wrinkling) and skin laxity, the primary effects of aging,Collagen loss is considered the most representative histological finding in aged skin.Nowadays, there is a great and widespread demand by patients to reduce the aging and photodamaging appearance by rejuvenation techniques, as a widespread and accepted cosmetic procedure.Ablative lasers have been accepted as the gold standard for photodamaged skin rejuvenation for more than half of a decade and many different light sources and light‐based systems have been developed and proven effective to reverse photodamage and age‐associated skin degeneration without epidermal damage.The goal of such non‐ablative devices, based on light or radiofrequency (RF), is to selectively heat the target without injuring the surrounding tissue.RF technology has been used in different medical areas such as cardiology, urology, and sleep medicine.Previous clinical studies showed that a time and temperature combination acts on remodeling and reorientation of collagen bundles with newly formed collagen induction in the follow up.A certain number of investigations about cosmetic results on the neck, cheeks, and submandibolar and periorbital laxity showed clinical improvements on a 30%–80% range in the follow‐up 3–6 months.In the following clinical study, following a simple open design, the short‐term efficacy of a non‐ablative RF treatment used for facial skin rejuvenation practice was assessed on healthy female volunteers. Clinical skin effects were evaluated in terms of hydration, elasticity, and sebum levels before and 1 h after the treatment.