� Wednesday, July 30, 2014 | Ahwatukee Foothills News | ahwatukee.com

CommunitymediCal adviCe

Ultherapy a sound way to

treat aging face

There’s no deny-ing that as aesthet-ic medicine has ad-vanced into the

mainstream by opening new markets and broad-ening the realistic poten-tial base, patients have begun to demand better

results, less dis-comfort, decreased risk and less down-time with the aes-thet-ic proce-dures they

choose to peruse. Before I describe Ulthe-

rapy in detail, one must understand from a his-torical perspective what modalities are available to treat the aging face. In 1901, patients had only one choice, a “skin-only face-lift,” which only in-volved the epidermis (the roof of the skin) and the dermis (the foundation of skin). In 1970, the skin and muscle surgical face-lift was introduced. In the 1990s, the short scar sur-gical face-lift was devel-oped as an outgrowth of the skin and muscle pro-cedure to minimize the scar by using a smaller in-cision. Short scar face-lift procedures may also be called Mini Lift, Quick Lift, Brow Lift, Fat Trans-fer Lift or Thread Lift. At the same time as the short scar face-lift was introduced, lasers were also first developed for fa-cial rejuvenation. Many of these lasers were ablative (meaning they removed the tissue) and are direct-ed toward the epidermis and superficial dermis of your skin. There are many types of these ab-lative lasers, but the best known are the CO2 (car-bon dioxide) or Fractional CO2 lasers. Patients who have these procedures take a longer time to recu-perate after the laser sur-gery. In 2002, the radio-frequency procedure was introduced. This proce-dure utilized radio waves

News, ideas and opinions on what’s important to Ahwatukeeahwatukee.comAhwatukee Foothills News online

Eugene Conte

Local high schools prepare

freshmen for start of school

By Daniel OchoaAhwATUkee FOOThILLS NewS

The first day of school for Desert Vista and Mountain Pointe high School is a week away, and to better equip in-coming students for their high school experience, both schools will host freshmen orientation events.

Desert Vista will host its Thunder Day for freshmen and any students who are new to the school.

During the event, incoming students will attend a mini-assembly and be given a brief synopsis of the day.

Afterward, students will visit each of their classes to meet with their teachers and ask any questions they might have about the school year.

Students will also attend a technology class where they’ll learn how to log onto the school’s system.

“we really try to give them a good overview,” said Tomika Bethea, assistant principal of activities at Desert Vista.

In the afternoon, students are broken up into three groups to attend a presen-tations by the counselors and coaches at the school about graduation requirements, dress code, athletic oppor-tunities and school policy.

The students’ day con-cludes with a prep rally.

Bethea said student coun-cil members help during Thunder Day by giving tours around the school to new stu-dents.

“It’s really about growing their community as a class of 2018,” she said. “we try to keep it light-hearted and fun.”

Parents who are new to Desert Vista can attend Thunder Day and will be giv-en an introduction about the school from educational ex-pectations to different school organizations.

Incumbent says negative political

signs hold no weightBy Allison Hurtado

AhwATUkee FOOThILLS NewS

Political signs lining the streets declare the names and goals of candidates for several offices in the state of Arizona but across the east Valley and Ahwatukee Foot-hills, there are also signs call-ing some incumbent Repub-lican legislators “liberal.”

The group behind those signs, Arizona Free en-terprise Club, says the at-tacks are necessary to ed-ucate voters.

“The club believes voters have a right to know where their representatives stand on the issues,” said Scot Mussi, president of Arizo-

na Free enterprise Club. “The Free enterprise Club has a long track record of supporting principled free market conservatives for of-fice, and when necessary, op-posing big government es-tablishment politicians like Bob Robson.”

Mussi said that in the last two years, state Rep. Robson has voted against pension reform, supported Common Core standards and voted to expand “Obamacare” in Arizona.

Robson said none of those accusations are accurate. he’s in favor of pension re-form, voted for Senate Bill 1609 in 2011, which was the

basis for several major pen-sion reforms, much of which ended up in court. he also presided over the largest overhaul of the state person-nel system in the history of the state and did it without any protests, he said.

The District 18 incum-bent said he never backed the Affordable Care Act but did support Gov. Jan Brew-er in expanding funding for AhCCCS, the state’s Medic-aid program, because it was dictated by the voters. hesaid he supports standards for schools set at the local level so kids are prepared for graduation.

“People can throw any-

thing against the wall, but people have elected me over and over,” Robson said. “They know me. They know I care. I care about people. we have an obliga-tion. These attacks — peo-ple will see right through them.”

Robson said when he looks at any bill, he tries to decide who it will help, who it hurts and who it affects.

The Arizona Free enter-prise Club is also opposing state Sen. Bob worsley in Mesa. The club is endorsing Jill Norgaard and John king in Legislative District 18. • Contact writer: (480) 898-7914 or ahurtado@ahwatukee.com.

eleCtion

Arizona Free Enterprise Club posted a sign opposing state Rep. Bob Robson on the intersection of 51st Street and Eilliot Road, as well as other intersections around Ahwatukee Foothills. [James Anderson/Special to AFN]

eduCation

>> See Conte on page 8 >> See Freshmen on page 8

� Wednesday, July 30, 2014 | Ahwatukee Foothills News | ahwatukee.com

to tighten the dermis in the skin. My patients who have had this procedure told me that it was extremely pain-ful. Although there are a number of radiofrequen-cy procedures available, the best known of these ra-diofrequency procedure is “Thermage.”

In 2009, the Micro-Fo-cused Ultrasound proce-dure was first introduced to the medical community. It is called Ultherapy. It was promoted as “the non-surgi-cal face-lift.” This procedure penetrates directly down to the muscle in your skin.

Ultherapy is a novel ultra-sound modality for non-in-vasive, non-surgical skin re-juvenation and lifting. It was developed with those very concepts in mind.

Ultherapy is the first and only energy-based device for facial aesthetics to re-ceive an FDA-approved in-dication for non-invasive lifting of not only the face but also the brow, submen-tal (under the chin), the neck’s dermal tissue and also the deeper subdermal tissues.

These are the same ar-eas that would be targeted

with a “surgical knife” when a patient decides to have a face-, brow- or neck-lift, only in the case of Ultherapy, it would be done with ultra-sound.

“The Ulthera System,” which represents a new cat-egory of treatment, com-bines ultrasound visual-ization of and beneath the skin’s surface with the de-livery of microfocused ther-mal coagulation points via ultrasonic energy to the skin and deeper fibromus-cular layers to stimulate col-lagen, which provides its lasting effect. This affords a level of precision heretofore unheard of given the super-ficial nature of the treat-ment.

The limited depth of pen-etration of treatment en-ergy also improves control and enhances the derma-tologist’s or plastic sur-geon’s ability to safely and accurately treat the patient while concurrently sparing other tissue layers.

The Ultherapy procedure may be optimal for some surgical candidates who are unwilling or unable to undergo facial surgery. Ul-therapy represents an al-ternative that allows some patients to postpone facial surgery or for the younger

person to delay the eventu-al onset of wrinkles as they progress through the nor-mal aging process.

Ultherapy may also serve a patient well for second-ary corrections of previ-ous unsatisfactory surgical scars that may be technical-ly challenging for a surgical revision. It also may repre-sent a simplified somewhat less-effective but more-ac-ceptable non-invasive alter-native for a patient that de-sires not to revisit surgery and present with stubborn, modest post-operative re-currences of a sagging brow, crow’s feet around the eyes and “bags under their eyes,” accentuations of facial lines and a small amount of sagging under their chin.

As with any modality, pa-tient selection and patient understanding is of para-mount importance. If you are considering Ulthera-py yourself and expect to achieve consistently good results, you must under-stand the following,

If you have severely sun-damaged skin and have had many precancers; thin/por-celain skin; scarred skin and tissue; severe laxity to your skin, fat and deeper muscles; systemic or local

infections or conditions that may compromise wound healing; or a long smoking history, you would not be considered an ideal candi-date for Ultherapy.

I expect the best results in my patients that have mild to moderate laxity of their forehead, brow, face and neck skin. I also tell my patients during their con-sultation that “if the skin under your chin and ante-rior neck is hanging down like a rooster’s, Ultherapy is not the procedure for you”.

During an office consulta-tion, my patient compared the skin on his face to the skin on his dog’s face, so I asked. “What kind of dog do you have?” He replied, “a basset hound.” I respond-ed “Ultherapy will do noth-ing for you. You need a face-lift.”

At least eight out of 10 of my patients have been pleased with their results, but I explain that because the way this treatment works on collagen, it will take three to three and a half months to begin to see improvement after the Ul-therapy procedure.• Dr. Eugene Conte is part of Ahwatukee Skin & Laser, 4425 E. Agave Road, Suite 148. Reach him at info@ahwatukeeskincare.com.

“It’s kind of like High School 101 for parents,” Bethea said.

Desert Vista will host its Thunder Day from 8:20 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Friday, Aug. 1, at Desert Vista, 16440 S. 32nd St.

For additional informa-tion about Thunder Day, call (480) 706-7900.

M o u n t a i n Pointe will pre-pare its 2018 freshmen class by hosting its annu-al Freshmen Boot Camp.

The camp, which is broken up into two days, gives incoming students an opportunity to learn about the communi-ty of Mountain Pointe and what it has to offer.

“We wanted to create an event for our incoming freshmen so that they would not feel so overwhelmed on the first day of school,” said Mary Catherine Boatright, staff member. “We’re a big school, and we found that kids were coming in on the first day not knowing where their lockers were, they didn’t know where their

classes were, they didn’t know anybody and it was frightening for them.”

During the boot camp, freshmen will meet with their teachers, be guid-ed through the school by student mentors and take part in team-building ac-tivities.

The student mentors will keep in contact with the freshmen to make sure the school year is going

smoothly for them and to ensure that they’re on the right track.

“They have a connection with those students after the boot camp,” Boatright said.

Students will also learn about extracur-ricular activates at Moun-tain Pointe.

Mountain Pointe’s Fresh-men Boot Camp will occur from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. Thurs-day, July 31, and 8 to 11 a.m. Friday, Aug. 1, at Moun-tain Pointe, 4201 E. Knox Road.

For additional informa-tion about the boot camp, call (480) 759-8449. • Contact writer: (480) 898-4903 or dochoa@ahwatukee.com.

Freshmen>> From page 6

Conte>> From page 6

“It’s kind of like High

School 101 for parents,”Tomika Bethea

assistant principal of activities at Desert Vista

ahwatukee.com | Ahwatukee Foothills News | Wednesday, July 30, 2014 17

company has created special packages. Schools could use Xtreme Video Game Party as an incentive for classes that turn in the most box tops or students who make the hon-or roll, Anderson said.

“Talk about an incentive,” he said.

He anticipates the demand for Xtreme Video Game Par-ty will lead to the company adding another theater.

“I just thought this was an-other avenue to provide a fun service for the community, especially focused on the kids

having fun,” Anderson said.For more information on

Xtreme Video Game Party, visit www.xtremegamepar-ty.com• James Anderson is a junior at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University. He is interning this semester for the AFN.

Gaming>> From page 16

State tourism returns to pre-recession levels

By Howard FischerCAPITol MedIA SerVICeS

Tourism in Arizona is now back to where it was before the recession — and SB 1070 — hit.

But it’s nowhere near where it should be, according to the state’s top tourism official.

Figures from a study done for the Arizona office of Tourism show that 39.1 mil-lion people visited the state and spent at least one night here in 2013. That includes 24.2 million from other states and 5.3 million international travelers.

The last time Arizona came close to that was in 2007 with 38.7 million visitors.

All those visitors plunked down $19.8 billion last year for everything from $2.7 billion on hotel rooms and $3.7 bil-lion in meals to $2.5 billion in retail sales.

State Tourism director Sherry Henry said the re-covery has been a long time coming. But Henry said there is more to be done.

“We’re not up as much as we would otherwise like to be,” she said. And Henry said there is reason to believe that Arizona can do better.

“Some of the other states are up more,” Henry said. And that, she said, shows peo-

ple are traveling — but not necessarily to Arizona.

“We’ve lost a little bit of market share over the last eight or nine years,” she said. The goal now, said Henry, is find ways to reclaim that mar-ket share.

Some of the problems that Arizona faced are not unique. The recession drove down travel pretty much every-where else, too.

Henry said the state’s own budget issues also resulted in less spending to promote Arizona as a destination. She said her agency is using the $7 million it got from the leg-islature, plus about $6.3 mil-lion it gets in tribal gaming revenue sharing, to focus tightly on where those dol-lars will get the best bang for the buck.

The key, said Henry, is to “go after people that we know love Arizona and have the greatest propensity to trav-el to Arizona and really zero in on that market.”

Some things will remain the same.

For example, aside from a general national marketing effort, the state also choos-es several local markets in hopes of convincing peo-ple that they’d really rather spend their vacation in Ar-

izona versus anywhere else. And, as always, much of that effort is focused on the Chica-go area, where residents, ea-ger to escape bitter winters — and anxious to follow their Cubbies to spring training — have traditionally flocked to Arizona.

last year’s focus on los An-geles is being scrapped in fa-vor of a new push this year at Minneapolis and Seattle.

Henry’s agency also gets some money from a 2000 ballot measure approved by Maricopa County voters that created a tax on hotel rooms and rental cars. But she said that money, by law, has to be spent for Maricopa County tourism.

She said, though, nothing precludes putting some of those dollars into campaigns to tell people that once they arrive in the Phoenix area, perhaps for spring training, they should consider getting out and seeing much of the rest of what Arizona has to offer.

one thing not addressed in the report is any residu-al effect of SB 1070, the 2010 legislation signed by Gov. Jan Brewer designed to give po-lice more power to detain and arrest those not in the coun-try legally.

Tourism

Tourist Ryszard Skrzypek, of Vienna, Austria, takes a photo of his wife Walendowska Malgorzata in front of a sign near the entrance to Grand Canyon National Park on Oct. 4, 2013. [AP Photo/Julie Jacobson]

4425 E. Agave Road, Suite 148Phoenix, Arizona 85044www.ahwatukeeskincare.com480.704.SKIN (7546)

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