Fat be gone!

If a few injections could dissolve a cottage cheese bum, shrink a chubby chin or slim saddlebags, would you get them?

You’ll need anywhere from one to six of these shots, possibly more, which cost about $200 to $600 per syringe, possibly more. The injections produce an immediate burning and swelling, and are believed to bloat your fat cells until they burst.

A literal fat blaster, if you will.

Lipodissolve, a treatment promised to do as its name suggests, has become a popular but controversial aesthetic procedure to reduce fat cells in small areas. Proponents say the treatments are a safe way to sculpt hard-to-reach spots that don’t yield to diet or exercise. Critics say the injection cocktails are untested, unregulated and potentially unsafe.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration hasn’t approved the use of phosphatidylcholine, a major component of lecithin and a staple of lipodissolve injections, for the use of fat cell elimination. Dr. Mary Harrow, who recently began offering lipodissolve injections at her Colorado Springs practice, said phosphatidylcholine will never be FDA-approved because it’s derived from plants.

Commercial lecithin is made from soybean, sunflower and rapeseed, according to pdrhealth.com.

The FDA seal of approval often becomes void with “off label” use. Botox Cosmetic, for example, is FDA-approved to treat frown lines between the eyebrows, but the injections are widely applied in other areas.

So would you pay for an injection to blast your fat cells?

“I’m amazed how many people are interested in this as the simple answer,” Harrow said. “It only is going to treat localized fat. It’s not a weight loss program.”

Harrow, who received her lipodissolve training at a three-day seminar in Las Vegas in July, said she fell into offering the procedure. Her practice, which has been in the Springs for 10 years, is mainly focused on integrative medicine — specifically prolotherapy, a procedure for treating chronic joint pain through ligament- and tendon-regeneration injections.

“Lipodissolve just kind of fell in my lap because of my skill set,” she said.

Treva Bremner, one of Harrow’s patients, recently started lipodissolve injections, hoping to slim her tummy.

The 61-year-old Colorado Springs resident said FDA approval wasn’t a concern, and the procedure was relatively painless.

“Compared to liposuction, the stuff she does is a piece of cake,” Bremner said.

About 10 injections were made into the area between Bremner’s bottom rib and her pelvic bone, she said. The area became “sore, but truly, it’s nothing compared to liposuction.”

She’s not sure how many treatments she’ll need, but Bremner said she could see results within the first week.

Harrow is picky about her clientele, and insists that her patients already lead a healthful lifestyle before considering injections. She won’t treat anyone with a body mass index greater than 27, and stresses that a healthy diet and regular exercise are crucial for the best results. Though many of her patients have asked about lipodissolve, she’s only treated three people, she said.

Lipodissolve injections are more common for Dr. Richard Harbison, who has been offering the procedure at his Colorado Springs office since 2003, when he was certified at a training seminar in Las Vegas.

Harbison said interest in the procedure has been relatively moderate.

“There’s not a big demand like there would be in Southern California, New York or Miami,” Harbison said. “But that’s because people in Colorado are a little behind in all aesthetic treatments.”

Critics don’t think that’s a bad thing.

One of the biggest concerns with lipodissolve is that the injections aren’t regulated — each doctor can use a different cocktail of enzymes and vitamins.

Lipodissolve is a procedure, not a product, so the cocktail used to dissolve fat varies from practice to practice.

Harrow, for example, uses a pre-mixed injection of 50 mg/ml of phosphatidylcholine and 42 mg/ml of deoxycholic acid.

Typically she injects 5cc of the substance at a time, though she said up to 20cc can be used in one session.

Harbison mixes his own cocktail of phosphatidylcholine, lidocaine, caffeine, aminophylline and carnitine, and typically injects 10cc of the solution in one session.

“In reality, there’s many different products in these injections,” said Dr. Theresa Pacheco, assistant professor in the department of dermatology at the University of Colorado at Denver and Health Sciences Center. “You need to know what you’re using.”

Though not popular at the university, the injections have been used to treat tough cases, Pacheco said.

For example, several injections of compounded phosphatidylcholine were shot into a patient’s lipomas (fat tumors) to try to eliminate the fat and ease pain. The treatment was unsuccessful, Pacheco said.

Lipodissolve is commonly used synonymously with mesotherapy, though some doctors argue the two terms aren’t interchangeable. “Mesotherapy” is a term pinned to the work of French doctor Michel Pistor, who pioneered the use of injections into the mesoderm (a connective layer of tissue that forms the dermis) in 1952 for pain relief. Today mesotherapy often refers specifically to fat reduction injections, or lipodissolve.

There are a number of organizations that promote, certify and train physicians for the procedure, but no agency regulates the materials in the injections or the number of injections.

Ultimately risk falls on the physician and patient, who may face unexpected side effects, Pacheco said.

Known side effects include swelling, itchiness and burning at the injection site, which usually lasts about 24 hours, Harrow said. Skin can become nodular for up to six months, but usually smooths out within one month, she said. More severe side effects include infection and bleeding, Harbison said.

Patient’s benefit: The procedure takes 10 to 15 minutes.

Doctor’s benefit: Patients pay cash.

CONTACT THE WRITER: 636-0152 or melissa.cassutt@gazette.com