PRP for skin.
A small amount of your blood is drawn, spun until the platelets separate out, and the platelet rich fraction is put back into your skin. Platelets carry the signals the body already uses to repair tissue, and the treatment borrows them.
It is a signal, not a filler.
Platelets are the cells that arrive first at any injury. They release growth factors, which are the chemical messages that tell surrounding cells to multiply, to build collagen and to grow new small blood vessels. Concentrating them and putting them where you want repair is the whole idea.
Because the material is drawn from you an hour earlier, there is nothing foreign to react to. There is no allergy risk and no question of what is in it, which is the reason it appeals to people who are uneasy about injectables generally.
The trade off is patience. Nothing is being added, so nothing looks different on the way home. What you are paying for is a repair process that runs over the following two to three months, and it builds with each session rather than arriving after the first.
What it treats, and what it does not.
Commonly treated
- Dull, tired looking skin with no obvious single fault
- Rough or uneven texture
- Fine crepey lines, particularly under the eyes and on the cheeks
- Hollowing and shadowing under the eye, where the skin is thin rather than the volume gone
- Early laxity, before it becomes something surgical
- Discolouration left behind after acne has settled
- Neck, chest and the backs of the hands, which age faster than the face and get treated less
Not what this does
- It does not add volume. A flat cheek needs filler, and no amount of PRP will substitute.
- It does not soften a frown line, which is muscle.
- It does not treat active, inflamed acne. That is a dermatology conversation first.
- It does not lift skin that has descended.
- It does not clear melasma or sun pigmentation, which need a different approach entirely.
- It does not work in one session, and anyone promising that is selling something else.
What actually happens.
Assessment
Medical history, medication and recent blood work if you have any. A few conditions and a few medicines make this unsuitable, and they are easier to find in conversation than afterwards.
Blood draw
A standard venous draw from the arm, the same as any blood test. A small volume, and the same advice applies: eat beforehand and drink water, because the people who feel faint are usually the people who skipped breakfast.
Spinning
The tube goes into a centrifuge for roughly ten minutes, which separates the blood into layers by weight. The platelet rich layer is drawn off. Your numbing cream goes on while this is happening, so the time is not wasted.
Delivery
Either injected in a grid of tiny deposits, or spread on the skin and driven in with microneedling, or both in the same visit. Which one suits you depends on whether the complaint is texture across an area or a specific hollow.
Straight afterwards
The skin is red and warm, similar to mild sunburn, and there may be small raised deposits where it was injected. Both settle overnight.
The course
Repeated at roughly four week intervals, three or four times. The gap matters, because you are waiting for the collagen response from the last one before triggering the next.
Recovery, described honestly.
Short, but not invisible. Plan it for a day when you are not being photographed.
- Redness and warmth for the rest of the day, largely gone by the next morning.
- Swelling under the eyes is the exception and can last two or three days. It is the most common surprise on this treatment.
- Small bruises at the injection points and at the blood draw site are normal.
- No makeup for twelve hours, so the skin is left alone while it closes.
- No exercise, sauna or hot shower for twenty four hours.
- Sunscreen daily, properly, from the next morning. Building collagen and then sitting in the sun is paying twice to stand still.
- Nothing visible happens for weeks. The first thing most people notice is texture, at around six weeks.
Reasons this is declined or postponed.
More of these are medical than on most treatments, because the treatment depends on your own blood working normally.
- Platelet disorders, clotting disorders, and low platelet counts
- Ongoing anticoagulant therapy, which is a discussion with the prescribing doctor rather than an automatic no
- Significant anaemia
- Active infection at the treatment site, or a cold sore anywhere near it
- Active cancer or ongoing cancer treatment
- Pregnancy and breastfeeding
- Systemic corticosteroids or a recent steroid injection, which blunt the response
- Anyone under eighteen seeking it for cosmetic reasons
When something else is the better answer.
PRP overlaps heavily with microneedling, and the honest answer is often to start with the cheaper one.
| Option | Where it genuinely wins | Where it does not |
|---|---|---|
| PRP for skin | Overall quality, thin crepey skin, and the area under the eyes where stronger treatments are risky. | Volume, muscle lines, pigment, and anyone wanting a visible change this month. |
| Microneedling alone | Acne scarring, enlarged pores and texture. Cheaper, and for scarring specifically it does the heavier lifting. | Thin skin under the eyes, and cases where the skin needs help healing rather than more injury. |
| Dermal filler | An actual hollow or a flattened cheek. Immediate, and visible on the way home. | Skin quality. A filled face with poor skin still looks tired. |
| A proper topical routine | Sunscreen and a retinoid outperform most in clinic treatments per dollar, and they work while you sleep. | Slow, and it will not resurface established scarring or thicken thin under eye skin. |
| Doing nothing | Reasonable. This is maintenance, not repair of something broken. | Nothing about ageing skin waits. |
Often asked about together.
About this treatment specifically.
Is this the vampire facial?
That name refers to PRP applied over microneedling, so it is one way of delivering this rather than a separate treatment. The photographs that made it famous were taken during the appointment, not afterwards. What people actually leave with looks like mild sunburn.
Does it hurt?
The blood draw is a standard needle in the arm. The face is numbed first, and after that it is a series of small stings. Under the eyes is the most sensitive area. Nobody describes it as painless, and nobody needs anything stronger than the numbing cream.
How many sessions do I need?
Three or four, four weeks apart, and then maintenance once or twice a year. One session is not a course, and the results people describe come from finishing one rather than sampling it.
When will I see something?
Texture at around six weeks, and the fuller effect between eight and twelve. This is the slowest treatment on the site to show itself, which is worth knowing before you book rather than after the first session.
Is it safe, given it is blood?
It is your own blood, drawn and returned within the hour, so there is no transfusion risk and nothing foreign to react to. The risks that remain are the ordinary ones of any injection: bruising, swelling and, rarely, infection at the site.
Will it fix my dark circles?
It depends what is causing them, and there are three possibilities. Thin skin showing the vessels underneath responds well. A true hollow needs volume rather than PRP. Brown pigmentation in the skin itself responds to neither, and needs a pigment focused approach. Working out which one you have is most of the appointment.
Can I have it with other treatments?
Yes, and it is often combined with microneedling in the same visit. It is not usually done on the same day as injectables, because one wants the skin left alone and the other deliberately disrupts it.
Call and describe what you notice.
416 475 324871 Albert Street, Oshawa, Ontario L1H 4R1.
Simok Aesthetics is a medical aesthetics clinic at 71 Albert Street in Oshawa, Ontario, offering injectables, skin treatments, PRP, vein treatment and IV nutrition therapy to patients across Durham Region.