With so many lasers on the market, patients get very confused on what is what, particularly when it comes to fractional laser technology. Fractional lasers are devices that deliver laser energy in a novel way that has changed the landscape of laser surgery forever. The technology has been around about 4-5 years with advances developing every couple years. Fractional resurfacing offers an improved balance between safety, efficacy and recovery time by treating skin in a ‘pixelated’ fashion.  Although the entire skin surface visually appears treated, microscopically there are treated areas separated by untreated areas. In effect, the healing tends to be quicker and safer. These areas of treatment are called microthermal zones, and they have changed the way we treat the skin.; allowing us to deliver laser energy to greater depths into the skin without increasing risks. Now the name Fraxel is actually a name brand of a laser developed by a company called Reliant that innovated the technology (now it is Solta medical).  Since its release about 5 years ago there are numerous copy cat technologies out on the market – pixel, active FX, matrix, Pearl. Deka, accent and so on. The differences between them all go beyond this discussion but the long and short of it is that I prefer and own the Fraxel brand of technologies. They are, in my opinion, the Rolls Royce of such technologies with the greatest clinical research and certainly the most progressive innovations. They have three different fractional technologies, providing a huge array of clinical applications and a broad spectrum of options for patients who have different needs in regard to results , recovery and risk. I will in, future blogs,  address each of these technologies which represent significant part of my laser practice. Now I am not saying that the Fraxel namebrand is the only effective technology. As with most technologies, the clinical results depends mostly on how the device is used, meaning the skill of the doctor to select the appropriate patient and then use the device to provide an expected result.