Total Body, Total Look

Ways of creating a smooth physique

SPECIAL PROMOTIONAL SECTION

Photo by Istock

Going for a makeover can be as simple as changing the color of your hair to as  dramatic as reconstructing what nature (and time) gave you. It can also mean changes in your habits and lifestyle.

For Lora Nakai, owner of Heaven on Earth Salon & Day Spa, the popular oasis for massages and spa packages for downtown’s work weary, the opening of her new 20,000-square-foot Heaven on Earth Spa, Club & Café in Kakaako is part of a new trend of educating and promoting self-care and wellness under one roof.

“For 10 years, we’ve created brand recognition for high quality, reliability and trust among working professionals that has helped us grow an average of 28 percent annually,” says Nakai, whose own hectic life as a wife, mother and business owner inspired the stress-relief services of Heaven on Earth. She calls her new facility a boutique fitness and spa center to reflect a personalized onestop approach sought by her customers to rejuvenate and refresh both their minds and bodies.

The new Kakaako facility has a fitness center with a wide variety of cardio-physical classes and services, including personal trainers, a yoga room, Pilates classes and a licensed nutritionist. It also features a 10-station hair salon offering Kerastase, a high-end hair-care line from Europe with anti-aging products for hair rejuvenation. The facility also offers traditional spa services, such as massages, body peels, cellulite treatments, and a manicure and pedicure suite, among other services.

Among Heaven on Earth’s latest offerings are couples massage treatments for husband and wife, as well as mother and daughter, and professional skin-care products you can use at home.

Smoothing the skin with noninvasive skin-care treatments is also the aim of Bareskin Hawaii. Under the direction of Dr. Kenneth K.H. Kau, a board-certified family-practice physician, Bareskin Hawaii offers years of experience together with constant upgrading of new and more advanced laser systems, to address all aspects of skin care.

Intense Pulsed Light™ therapy, FotoFacial™, Fraxel™, Titan™, Parisian Peel™, Microdermabrasion and Skin Medica™, Vitalize and Illuminize skin peels are among treatments available for all age groups to address a range of personal skin concerns, from unwanted hair to adolescent skin issues, and hormonal issues for older patients to correct, even, firm and lift skin.

According to Kau, “you have to care about yourself first of all. Maintenance comes from you through healthy diet, exercise, antioxidants, good home-care skin care, drinking lots of water and working with knowledgeable experts for good skin treatments to help take care of you in the long run.”

Total makeover

“Every 10 years, we’re doing a whole new menu of offerings due to demand and technology advances,” says Dr. Randy Wong, chief of plastic surgery at Straub Clinic & Hospital.

Dr. Wong and his Straub colleagues offer a full gamut of plastic-surgery services, ranging from therapeutic procedures such as hand surgery, burn care and post-mastectomy reconstruction to cosmetic surgeries covering eyelid, facial reconstruction and rejuvenation,and body enhancements. Among the latter’s most popular procedures are breast lifts, tummy tucks and liposuction, catering to the majority of patients, women in their late 40s to late 50s.

Last year, Straub’s plastic surgeons saw an increase in combination procedures, such as a tummy tuck and breast lift, for example, in one fell swoop.

“Patient expectations and readiness are important considerations for elective surgery, which carries risks,” says Wong. “We are not magicians or miracle workers, so it’s important to find out what is bothering a patient.”

For safety and peace of mind, he emphasizes the importance of finding a surgeon with a high level of training in procedures who has been board-certified by the American Board of Plastic Surgeons. An affiliation with a hospital is the safest for cosmetic surgeries, according to Wong.

Straub also offers a variety of nonsurgical cosmetic procedures with Botox and injectable fillers (called hyaluronic acid), the best known of which is Restylane, at the top of the most-requested list. Depending on the length of time a patient wishes to have the skin-smoothing effects of such fillers to last, new injectables can offer a range of options, including Juvederm™ (3 to 6 months) and Perlane® (1 to 2 years), and permanent fillers, such as Artefill®.

Recently, in keeping Straub’s emphasis on wellness and a recognition of traditional and alternative healing arts, Wong has branched out to provide nutritional supplements for cellular health and rejuvenation and has formed affiliations with two reputable clinics providing alternative therapies. Manakai O Malama, an integrated medicine clinic under the direction of Dr. Ira Zunin, offers acupuncture, massage and physical therapies. The Zen Spa, established by Dr. Bradley Sakaguchi, who is on the medical staff at Straub, offers aromatherapy, massages, facial skin care and other spa salon services. Both clinics are part of a nationwide trend of licensed physicians establishing medical spas.

At the Athena Clinic, founder Dr. Robert Peterson, who also serves as chief of plastic surgery at Kapiolani Medical Center for Women and Children, has international affiliations with clinics in Fukuoka, Japan, Bangkok, Thailand and Sydney, Australia. At the Hawaii center, plastic-surgery procedures are done by Peterson at Kapiolani, while nonsurgical skin-care procedures and products are available at the clinic’s Keeaumoku facility.

Breast lifts and tummy tucks are among the most popular surgical procedures requested at the Athena Clinic. Fat removal is also high on the list, with a variety of remedies available today; it can be dissolved, sucked out and even moved from an undesirable or hidden part of the body, much like a skin graft using one’s own tissue, to plump fat loss in the face for a smoother, younger look, according to Peterson. And it’s permanent.

Another trend: the return of new-generation silicone breast implants, says Peterson, whose clients are generally women in their 40s and 50s.

The biggest growth for Athena Clinics has been in nonsurgical procedures. In addition to Botox and injectable fillers, Peterson points out newer facial treatments, such as Thermage, which is available only from qualified physicians, and is known as a unique, noninvasive procedure to tighten and contour aging skin.

Athena Clinics offers one of the newest, only recently FDA-approved for body contouring  Procedures, called Velashape™, a noninvasive, virtually painless treatment, with no downtime, for cellulite that treats both the deeper tissue and the upper layers of skin for measurable reduction in fat layers.

For those wanting to look like Angelina Jolie or Brad Pitt, practitioners interviewed for total body rejuvenation agree with Peterson, who emphasizes that procedures aim to have patients “ideally as naturally as who they are, but looking like a better them.”