For licensed skincare professionals
At-home maintenance after a professional treatment
10 minutes of handover. Seven days of home routine.
What the client does between leaving the room and the next appointment. This page is deliberately generic: it covers the home routine, and the treatment itself is described by the professional who performed it.
The protocol is the treating professional's clinical decision.
Who this is for
Every client who leaves the room with intact skin after a professional treatment, and who will manage their own skin for the next seven days. It is written to sit underneath any professional treatment without naming one, so a single card can be used across the whole service menu.
It is most needed by the clients who feel fine. A client whose skin is visibly reacting will follow instructions. A client who feels normal by the next morning will resume their own routine, and that is the failure mode this page exists to prevent.
Who this is not for
- Skin that is broken, weeping or crusted. Follow the treating professional's own aftercare.
- Any client holding written post-care instructions from a physician. Those take precedence over anything here, without discussion.
- Any client whose treating professional has specified a different sequence or a different interval. Theirs is the instruction that counts.
- Known sensitivity to any ingredient used. Check the full INCI.
Before you begin
Write the card before the client sits up. Two dates go on it: the date actives resume, and the date of the next appointment. Everything else on the card is a routine; those two lines are the decisions.
Ask what they already use, by product name. "Just a serum" is not an answer. Anything prescribed is written down and left alone; it is not yours to pause or restart.
The seven days
| Window | Cleanse | Apply | Not in this window |
|---|---|---|---|
| Evening of the treatment | Nothing. Do not cleanse again. | Soothing Recovery Gel, thin layer, on the areas that feel warm. AquaCell Moisturizer over it. | Makeup, actives, exfoliation, hot water, exercise, alcohol |
| Day 1 | Comfort Cleansing Milk, 1 pump, cool water, morning and evening | Bio-Ferment Essence Toner pressed in. Vital Recovery Serum on damp skin. AquaCell Moisturizer. Sun protection in the morning. | Any acid, any retinoid, any scrub, any brush or device, sauna, steam, swimming pools |
| Days 2 to 3 | As day 1 | Add one 1.5 ml application of Hyaluronic Skin Repair from a sealed vial on the evening of day 2, drawn through the stopper, onto damp skin. Barrier Repair Cream at night on any area that feels tight. | Actives still paused. No makeup brushes that have not been cleaned. |
| Days 4 to 5 | As day 1 | A second 1.5 ml application from the same vial on the evening of day 4. Otherwise unchanged. | Direct sun, self-tan, hair removal on the treated area |
| Days 6 to 7 | Standing cleanse resumes | Resume the standing routine. Reintroduce one active only, in the evening, at the frequency written on the card. | Reintroducing two actives at once |
The one thing that determines whether this works: the restart date is written down. Aftercare delivered out loud while a client is putting their shoes back on is not aftercare. Clients do not fail this routine by applying the wrong product; they fail it by resuming their own routine on day two because their skin felt fine. A date on a card, in your handwriting, is the entire intervention.
Frequency and course
After every professional treatment, without exception, including the ones that feel like nothing. Seven days, then the standing routine.
If the next appointment falls inside seven days, the home routine stops at the appointment and this page restarts from the top afterward.
Aftercare rules that hold across all seven days
- Cool or lukewarm water only. Never hot.
- Blot dry with a clean towel. Do not rub, and do not reuse yesterday's towel.
- Sun protection every morning, from any brand. Vegalab does not sell an SPF product, and seven days of careful home care can be spent in one afternoon outdoors.
- No hair removal on the treated area, by any method.
- No new products of any kind. This is not the week to try something.
- Hands off. Touching, pressing and inspecting in the mirror all count.
What to expect, and when
The first evening: the skin feels warm and looks flushed, and it settles as the evening goes on. Comfort improves with cool, not with more product.
Days 1 to 3: the skin can feel tight, look slightly matte, and hold makeup differently. Some clients report a day of increased sensitivity to their usual moisturizer. Simplify rather than substitute.
Days 4 to 7: comfort back to baseline, texture smoother to the hand, the treatment result at its most visible.
Scope: this routine keeps the skin comfortable and undisturbed while it settles, and it stops the client from working against their own appointment. If the skin is reacting, the answer is the treating professional or a physician, not another layer.
Home maintenance beyond day seven
Day seven is the retail conversation, and it is the honest one: the treatment was the visible step, the routine is what holds it to the next appointment.
Core, from day 1: Comfort Cleansing Milk, Bio-Ferment Essence Toner, AquaCell Moisturizer. Three products, one decision.
Add at day 7: Barrier Repair Cream at night for skin that still feels tight, or a ten-vial box of Hyaluronic Skin Repair for twice-weekly use. Each vial covers three 1.5 ml applications, so a box is about fifteen weeks and carries across several appointment intervals.
Keep on the shelf: Soothing Recovery Gel and Vital Recovery Serum, so the first evening after the next treatment does not require a purchase at the door.
Show the vial mechanics once. The cap flips off, the syringe draws through the stopper, the stopper stays where it is. Clients who pull the stopper out have thrown away the reason the format exists.
When to refer
Refer to a physician, and tell the client to contact the treating professional first if that is faster, if:
- Swelling increases after 48 hours rather than decreasing.
- There is blistering, weeping, crusting or any change the treating professional did not describe in advance.
- Pain, as opposed to discomfort, at any point.
- Redness with a defined, advancing edge, or any fever.
- Anything the client finds alarming and cannot reach the treating professional about.
A client asking whether a reaction is normal is asking a clinical question. The correct answer is not reassurance from the retail counter.
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