 A tattoo is balls of ink that are injected into the superficial layers of the skin and these balls of ink are captured by immune cells and they're stored in those immune cells but the balls of ink are too big for those immune cells to digest and carry away so they get stuck in the skin inside these immune cells called macrophages. The principle of laser is that it shoots a beam of energy into the skin of a specific wavelength and that will target that pigment, exploded into smaller particles and those smaller particles can now be captured by these immune cells, these macrophages and carried away in the bloodstream and excreted and destroyed externally. They used to think they could just put laser onto the tattoo pigment and the ink would absorb the heat and disappear. What they didn't factor was that the tattoo pigment sitting in tissue, if you heat the pigment you'll burn the surrounding tissue. The first breakthrough occurred in the early 90s when they were able to make lasers that had a very short pulse width in the nanosecond range. Some colors like black absorb all colors so any Q switch laser, peak or second laser can remove black. Other colors are much more difficult to remove. Pain for example requires a red color laser light. The peak assure is a peak or second laser, a peak or second is a trillionth of a second and the current one, the first and only one in production, the peak assure is running at about 700 trillionths of a second. We have just introduced these lasers into Australia so we can only comment on the research experience in the US. What they found there was that previously resistant green, some cases were moving in two or three treatments and general tattoos seem to clear in half the time of the conventional nanosecond technology. I'm here today to have my tattoos removed. I've had them done for seven years. I found in the last probably 12 months to 15 months that I've been quite I suppose conscious of them. I suppose after the treatment I won't have to worry about trying to cover my feet up all the time. My first one was at a tattoo parlor and I only ever had one tattoo done at a tattoo parlor. I got one done by a guy that I met over in Thailand who did some with bamboo which was a really nice experience. I did some of them myself with a needle strapped to a chopstick. When you're having a laser tattoo removal it is essentially a medical procedure and every medical procedure carries with it risks. Feet are sensitive areas and because the laser may hurt a little, rather than giving you the choice, I'm going to actually suggest you put some anesthetic in now. If you're used to much power you will burn the surrounding tissue. It will ulcerate and you'll be left with holes in the skin that heal with scarring. And unfortunately new operators tend to have this problem. There's a learning curve. The power relates to the size of the treatment spot. So you'll see as I increase the spot size, the energy which is measured in joules per centimetre squared goes down and that's the aiming beam which tells us where the light will go. Because you've never had the treatment before, we need to work out what the right power setting is. One of the big mistakes in tattoo removal is using too much power early and you know people think oh the more power the faster we'll go, not true, that's how you get a scar. In Western Australia they have legislation meaning that only doctors can use lasers or nurses supervised by doctors. In New South Wales and Victoria there's currently no legislation but I believe it's being worked on. So basically anybody can do it. It's a problem. And the other problem too is these lasers also work on moles and freckles and things and mixed in with that are melanomas. So if the people have no training in skin diagnosis, it's just totally inappropriate. Okay here we go. Steam we think forms in the cells so it goes white and if you have a look at it immediately afterwards it all looks white. A few seconds later it looks black again when the steam comes through and those tiny little droplets of blood are not from the laser there from the anesthetic. When the anesthetic wears off will I feel much pain in that area? No I don't think you'll feel a thing but by any stinging or irritation will have worn off by the time the anesthetic wears off. Now I'm just you know we're moving it fairly quickly so I'm looking for any mysteries. Yes so how are you feeling now? Good it feels a bit numb and a bit tingly but yeah great can't feel a thing. We're hoping four or five treatments will clear these. When I first got them I really liked them I really liked being part of that culture I enjoyed getting the tattoos. They just don't mean what they meant to me when I first got them. If my children wanted to have tattoos I could understand why they'd want them and then a few years after they got them I could probably understand why they might want them removed. I would tell them think very deeply think about who you want to see it meaning site selection if their first tattoo should be in a site that they only have to show to people who they want to and if possible pick black ink because that's the easiest ink to remove.