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Tattoos are more popular today then ever before, however, it is estimated that between 17 – 50% eventually regret having a tattoo. Tattoo removal is a confusing step, and a rather new one. Tattoo removal has only been an option for the last 20 years.
Largely it’s through regret. Many people have a tattoo on the spur of the moment, or have something inscribed which no longer has the meaning it once had. Tattoo removal is also required for professional reasons as some occupations, such as the military, have rule regarding visible body decoration.
Usually local anaesthetic but a very large tattoo may require general anaesthetic.
If the tattoo is small it can usually be excised in one stage but if it is large it may have to be excised in more than one stage (serial excision). This means multiple operations three months apart until the whole tattoo is removed.
Occasionally a very large tattoo that distresses the patient will have to be excised and the area resurfaced with a skin graft. This, however, leaves the patient with a donor site scar or a scar from where the skin graft has been taken from. The patient may however prefer this to that of a tattoo.