Life in L.A.: Dr. Will Kirby, tattoo removal specialist

The business of removing tattoos is about regrets, reversals and clean slates. It's medical science that makes this business possible.

The lasers used in tattoo removal (quality-switched, or Q-switched, lasers) work by a search-and-destroy method. Instead of cutting out a tattoo or burning it off, the laser technology recognizes the hyper-pigmented skin and breaks up the ink into particles.

Ultimately, “tramp stamps,” ex-girlfriends’ names and the purple butterfly that once meant so much are no more. Over the course of several treatments, the markings of your past can completely disappear.

During a procedure, patients wear eye-protective goggles, put on numbing cream and squeeze a stress ball, and within minutes their laser treatment is completed.

We recently interviewed Dr. Will Kirby of the Beverly Hills-based Dr. Tattoff, a tattoo removal company that has seen it all -- and then erased it.

What’s involved in removing a tattoo?

There are a lot of different ways to remove tattoos, but the gold standard is a quality-switched laser. In the last seven to 10 years is when that technique became readily available.

The other types of removal have become obsolete because the Q laser leaves virtually no scarring.

Are there any dangers to having a tattoo removed?

Every medical device, every medicine has good side effects and bad side effects. The procedure is very painful. It is uncomfortable, but tolerable. That’s a bad side effect, but it does occur. You also get a little swelling and pinpoint bleeding.

The laser works by selective photothermolysis. The laser goes in and fragments the ink, but does virtually nothing to your surrounding skin.

Are there any dangers in getting a tattoo?

What’s funny is that we have a great relationship with tattoo artists. They have a motto: fresh for fresh skin. So oftentimes we see people who are coming in to have tattoos removed in order to make space for new ones. Maybe it’s an ex-lover or something they are no longer involved in, like a band or a gang. So they’ll get those tattoos removed and have fresh ink put on.

There are some risks in getting a tattoo. Most shops are pretty clean, but there have been cases of people getting hepatitis B and C, HIV and even tuberculosis.

Can you remove a tattoo permanently without scarring?

It takes multiple treatments to remove a tattoo. Typically the treatments are spaced out by several weeks. The number of treatments depends on several factors: color, size, location of the tattoo.

The easiest color to remove is black ink. As you get more colors, the harder it becomes to remove. Yellow is very hard to remove. 

If you can feel the tattoo, then you’ll always feel it. If it is kind of raised before you come to see me, it is going to be harder to remove.

Why is yellow hard to remove?

The laser light has a specific wavelength of light that black preferentially absorbs. Yellow doesn’t absorb any amount of laser wavelength at all. Green can be challenging as well.

What’s the most regretted type of tattoo?

If you can think of it, I’ve seen it. We’ve seen penis tattoos.

If you get your lover’s name on your body, that’s the kiss of death for the relationship.

We’ve seen a lot of barbed-wire arm bands and tribal arm bands. The Tasmanian Devil and Tweety Bird.
And what was affectionately known as the “tramp stamp.” Girls are definitely regretting that one.

Who are your patients?

Approximately 85% of my patients are women with annual incomes of over $50,000, between the ages of 18 and 44. A lot of young women are stigmatized by their past.

Would you advise people to simply not get tattoos in the first place?

I’m not one to judge. I encourage it, as long as you do it safely. A properly done tattoo has no health ramifications.

When did your business open? Have you seen a year-over-year increase in patients?

The Beverly Hills clinic opened in 2005. Irvine opened in 2006, and the Encino clinic in 2007.

Yeah, absolutely, we definitely saw a dip at the end of last year as the macro-economy had dipped.
But that seems to have corrected, as 2009 is the best it’s ever been.

When you are searching for a job or going into the military, you don’t want tattoos in visible places.

Have you seen patients in your office that are kids [under 18] who got tattoos illegally?

We treat people who are under 18 one or two times per week. They are usually accompanied by an angry parent.

What’s the cost of having a tattoo removed?

Generally, it costs five to 10 times the amount to remove the tattoo as it did to get the tattoo. Price varies based on color and location. Depending on where the tattoo is -- the very vascular parts of the body respond much faster. Parts of the body that have poor drainage take longer to heal.

How did you get into this business?

As a first-year resident after medical school, I had to write a paper on tattoo removal. I realized there was a huge void there.

-- Lori Kozlowski

Photo credit: Anne Cusack / Los Angeles Times

Comments

[Peter]

Tattoos are the very EPITOME of LOW CLASS AND VULGAR !

Why anyone would want one is beyond me ?

Think of the people you meet for the first time -- if they have a lot of tattoos, or all over their bodies, you think (well, at least I think) "TROUBLE - LOW CLASS - EX-CON, BIKER, HELL's ANGEL, T-R-O-U-B-L-E !!"

Life is hard enough without dealing with tough, low-class, vulgar people any more than you have to. And they're everywhere, unfortunately.

[Wyrdwoman]

Well, I'd have to say that not all people (myself included) are excons, lowlifes, or 'trouble'. I can say that for myself it was a personal decision I based upon my Spritiual practice. I have three - all easy to hide, not very big (largest is the size of a softball) and all have a very special meaning to me. They are beautiful. Before judging those who have so many consider the indigenous tribes that practice this a a right of passage. We have no such ceremonies in our current society. Sad but true, the closest we get is having 21 drinks for our 21st B-day - very dangerous. My daughter also has a tattoo. She chose a bear pawprint on her arm with her babies footprint in the pad of the paw. Not something I think she'll soon regret...

[Hey]

Good to see Will going back to doing honest work after his stint in reality television. He's picked an industry that will probably never go away--there are some truly awful and stupid-looking tattoos out there. I predict that the guy covered in Disney characters (George Reiger) will be in to see him after a while...!

[Jenna]

His assistant should also be wearing protective eye gear.

[guyeichberg]

I want a 'trampstamp.' And I am a guy. My name is guy.

[Dig Deep]

He should locate his office next door to a tattoo shop.
Gang tattoos are not good references.

[LOL]

"LOWCLASS" "BIKER"? what is this 1920? I don't like tattoos to be honest, but you my friend are a retard, and as a member of your species I would remind you that you are making us all look bad.

[matt]

I'm getting the tattoos in my arms removed... to make there new ones

[Jesse]

Peter,

No offense but you sound like someone living in the distant past. You are right that at one point tattoos were a symbol of "low class" (whatever that really means). But get with the times my friend. Hell's Angels? What is this, 1969?

Tattoos are completely mainstream at this point. All types of people among all different kinds of social and economic classes have them. I'm grew up upper middle class. I am college educated and the son of a lawyer, hardly "low class" and definitely not a criminal. I have a tattoo that I do not regret nearly 10 years later, and I plan on getting more. They are very personal to most of the people who get them. It's just a form of art. You may not like it but that doesn't mean the people who do are somehow beneath you.

[JT]

I'd like to see the "Dr. Tattoff" show come on immediately following L.A. Ink. It'd only truly be funny if you could see an episode of someone getting a tattoo on one show, then removing it on the next. (could be possible in reruns)

[Joe Pillar]

The author should spend a little more time studying lasers.

To answer everyone's questions:

1) The "gold standard" laser for tattoo removal is a "Q-Switched Frequency-Tripled YAG" pump laser driving a "Tunable Dye Laser".

The Q-switched laser http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Q-switching generates an incredibly short, powerful pulse of UV light http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optical_frequency_multiplier, and the second laser takes that light and changes it to the color of the tattoo ink (like glow-in-the-dark paint under a black light). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dye_laser

The colored light (say green) passes through the skin (say pink) without being absorbed but is strongly absorbed by the tattoo ink, heating the ink particles until they literally explode. (They're tiny. It doesn't hurt....much). The body then flushes the "cracked" ink particles away.

Black tattoo ink can be removed by almost any color of laser light. A tunable dye laser allows multiple colors of tattoo ink to be removed with fewer, less painfull sessions.

2) The photo of the assistant not wearing safety glasses is clearly staged. The laser she is using is a CLASS 4 device. Even a reflection of a reflection of the output of that system could cause permanent eye damage.

[eddie ledezma]

Hey dont judge people for what they like to do to there body's some say its art, some say its what they injoy in what they get like there culture (AZTECA) tatts, others like "STARS" everyone is into something different. So for those people to judge others for what they love to get screw them. I myself is covered with tatts arms and legs so that makes me an bad guy? Why is i covered of them is cause i injoy the art and sad to say is i also like the pain that comes with it. So for those people that like to misjudge us to having tattoos look into the mirror and judge yourself before you judge someone else..

[Asghar]

Tattoos are permanent sign of temporary insanity.

[James B]

"Tattoos are the very EPITOME of LOW CLASS AND VULGAR "....
Posted by: Peter

Personally I'd rank bad grammar a tad lower.

George Schultz spoke and wrote standard English, had a tattoo, and was the US Secretary of State during the Reagan administration.

[Alexander Apostoleris]

Hey peter, thats a funny comment you made?
How about past hypes that people had first started, piercing? What about traditions that were put down before, yet now are valued in your society. You are obvioulsy blind, the amount of people with tattoos and enormous, and they cannot all be "TROUBLE - LOW CLASS - EX-CON, BIKER, HELL's ANGEL, T-R-O-U-B-L-E !!"
If this was true, our society as a whole would be in alot worse of condition, and tatoos would ultimately be banned due to the culture that it represents.
Keep an open mind.

[DO's are second class]

Kirby is an idiot DO ( not an MD) what a loser. Such a loser

[Sebastian Proyb]

I'm planning to open a tattoo-removal business called "Tattoodle-oo".

[Larouix]

I spent a half day one night in a busy tattoo parlor, filming some participants. Most were teen and early 20 years olds, male and female. The women seemed a bit more sophisticated than their boyfriends. I didn't see any bikers at all.
The owner said he did a great business. I commented that his customers come in with cash and a smile, and leave bleeding with less money. And they are happy about that.

Certainly many of them change their attitude with maturity and may eventually want to change their appearance, including the tattooed skin. Not so pretty, in my estimation.

[happyziggy]

I have to agree with Peter.
There is ALWAYS a better canvas.

[No Inc.]

I have to admit that, the vast majority of people I have met, whom sport visible ink; are self-involved, infantile and lack a proper sense of respect for self and objective standards for performance and productivity.

While each has protested individuality, it seems that each was part of a mediocre and nearly illiterate segment of the workforce.

Predicated solely upon their performance, I have had to discharge each--without exception, and to a person--from my employ.

I have seen similar lack of deportment and self-respect from those who sport an over abundance of "metal"--although to a lesser degree.

At his point in my professional life, I don't have time to waste on a candidate who displays extremes of adornment, either of ink or metal; nor am I inclined to allow that person the opportunity to negatively impact the morale and productivity in my office setting.

It is far more efficient and economical to say, "Don't call us. We'll call you." and to throw their application and CV into the wastebasket.

That's life. Learn to deal with it.

[PB&J]

Keep an open mind, but not so open that your brain falls out=0)

[Michael]

I agree with Peter that tattoos are extremely vulgar although I do not expect people with vulgar tastes to recognize that. Just because there are more tattooed people around does not make it less vulgar. It only shows that there are more vulgar people around.

[Sassy]

Eddie Ledezma stop wasting money on tattoos and spend more time in school. Your grammer/spelling/run on sentences etc are atrocious!

[Indie Vidwall]

There was a time when tattoos were the province of those outside societal mainstream, like sailors of old who went to exotic isles. Then it was the rock singers.

And in the last 10 years, tattoos and body piercing has become the mark of the conforming middle class teenager, getting a tattoo or a pierce like all the other boys and girls. Or more extreme or extensive tatts have been a mark of identification with non-mainstream groups.

People who see themselves outside mainstream, such as rockers, gang members, performers, punks, supremacists, etc, need to push the boundaries with extreme tattoo art or body coverage.

Some tattoos can be wonderful artistic statements, expressions of individuality and con-conformity. Other tatts can simply be a conformist, pampered and protected middle-class kid pretending to be wild and individual.

My bias? I feel that tatts are fine. I get grossed out by body piercings on parts of the body that secrete fluids - noses, lips (and other areas). And around the eyes are a distraction if I need to interact with that person.

But at the end of the day it is an individual decision that, like any fashion choice makes a public statement.

[Curmudgeon10]

As a now retired CEO, I couldn't agree more with No Inc.'s description of the way life is.

One of the companies I ran encountered a situation where our medical insurance rates depended on the number of smokers we had on staff. We put an ash tray in our waiting room where people sat awaiting interview, and culled out the smokers.