ROY GERONEMUS, MD: I think, in a spa, if you're looking for beauty treatments or to improve the condition of your skin, one should do one can do procedures like facials, very light chemical peeling, massages, procedures that do not necessarily injure the skin or carry risk.
ANNOUNCER: The most problematic procedures are those that are more invasive: laser treatments, certain acne treatments, Botox injections and collagen and other filler injections.
So if people are considering one of these more potentially risky procedures, what can they do to protect themselves?
ROY GERONEMUS, MD: Procedures where there is any type of injury to the skin or the potential for injury really should be done by a physician in a medical setting.
In choosing a physician, there are a number of different ways that you can find the appropriate person for your condition. One is to go to a website, such as the website for the American Society for Dermatologic Surgery. The second is to ask your physician, your primary care physician or another skin physician, a dermatologist, who the appropriate person would be to treat the condition that I have.
You'd like to make sure that physician has experience. You would like to make sure that physician is board-certified. These are the questions that you can ask the physician himself or the physician's office. If need be, you can check with the state regulatory bodies to make sure that, in fact, that physician is licensed and is in good standing.
