What is a BBL Photofacial?

BBL stands for BroadBand Light. It uses filtered light to target what sits in your skin that shouldn’t be there: sun damage, brown spots, broken capillaries, and the persistent flush of rosacea. The light is absorbed by pigment and by the vessels causing redness, breaking them down so your body can clear them. At the same time, it prompts your skin to build collagen.

Nashville Skin Company is physician owned and has been treating clients in the Nashville area since 2013, and on our Sciton system since 2016. Your treatment will be performed by one of our licensed medical estheticians, each with years of hands-on experience on this exact platform.

A Stanford study published in the Journal of Investigative Dermatology found that regular BBL treatments shifted gene expression in aged skin toward patterns found in younger skin. That’s an unusual thing to be able to say about an aesthetic treatment.

What BBL can correct

Most people don’t come in asking for a specific laser. They come in with something they’d like to change. Here’s how we match the treatment to the concern.

Brown spots and sun damage

Years of sun leave behind freckling, age spots, and uneven patches. BBL targets that pigment directly and breaks it up so your skin can clear it.

Redness and rosacea

If you flush easily, or have visible capillaries around your nose and cheeks, BBL treats the small vessels causing it and evens out your overall tone.

Acne and breakouts, with Forever Clear

Three passes of light: one to clear the bacteria living in your pores, one to bring down inflammation and redness, and one to support your skin’s own healing. Worth considering if topicals haven’t gotten you where you want to be.

Anti-aging, with Forever Young

If your complexion has lost some of its clarity and firmness, Forever Young keeps collagen active and your tone even. This is the one clients come back for year after year, and it’s the version the Stanford research looked at.

We also treat hands, half arms, and full arms.

Getting ready for your treatment

BBL works by targeting pigment. That means if your skin is tan, the light can’t tell the difference between a sun spot and an overall tan. To keep your treatment both safe and effective:

Stay out of the sun for at least two weeks beforehand
No spray tan or self-tanner. The device reads these exactly the way it reads a real tan.
If you arrive with a tan, we’ll need to reschedule, and fees apply

Is BBL right for you?

Before we treat, we’ll talk through your history and scan your skin in our imaging system. That shows us what’s happening below the surface and tells us whether BBL is the right tool for what you want to correct.

BBL may not be the right choice if you’re pregnant or nursing, take a medication that increases light sensitivity, have used Accutane in the past six months, have an active skin infection, have a history of keloid scarring, or have melasma, which BBL can sometimes worsen.

Skin tone matters as well. Because BBL works by targeting pigment, it’s best suited to lighter skin tones. If your skin is deeper, BBL likely isn’t the right treatment for you, and Halo is often a better fit. We’ll walk you through that at your consultation. Our goal is to get you into the treatment that will genuinely work for your skin.

How many treatments you’ll need

Most people see their best results from a short series rather than a single visit. For brown spots and overall tone, that’s usually two to four treatments spaced three to four weeks apart. For breakouts, it’s typically four to six treatments spaced one to two weeks apart, followed by occasional maintenance.

We’ll tell you what to expect before we begin, and we’ll look at your skin again months later to see how it responded.

What to expect afterward

Right after, your skin will feel warm and look slightly flushed, a little like a light sunburn. That usually settles within a few hours.

Over the next two to three days, your brown spots will get darker rather than lighter, and may take on a speckled, coffee-ground texture. This is exactly what should happen. It means the pigment is lifting.

Between five and seven days on the face, and up to two weeks on the body, that darkened pigment flakes away on its own and leaves clearer skin behind. Let it shed naturally rather than picking or scrubbing at it.

Caring for your skin afterward

Wear a broad spectrum SPF 30 or higher every day and stay out of direct sun. Skip harsh exfoliants for a week. Most people head straight back to work and their normal routine.