Freezing Fat Away With CoolSculpting

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- No needles, no recovery time and no more muffin top.

These are the claims behind the newest weight-loss procedure to hit your dermatologist's office.

It's called CoolSculpting and it was just recently approved by the FDA. And as the name suggests, the cold is deliberate.

"It causes the cells to naturally die," said Dr. Charles Crutchfield III, clinical professor and medical director at Crutchfield Dermatology.

Children eating popsicles -- that's how they thought of it.

"These little kids would eat it all the time and keep it in their cheeks," Crutchfield said. "They noticed after a few months, they'd get a little dimple of fat that was missing in their cheeks."

Thus, the million dollar idea; if you freeze fat, it melts away.

Patient Deanna Poirer said she lost more than three inches by putting in just one hour of effort.

"Almost feels like a mammogram on your stomach," she said.

Crutchfield said the ideal candidate for CoolSculpting is someone who has a small area of unwanted fat.

"Little areas under the tummy, under the belly button, love handles, muffin tops," Crutchfield said.

Poirer chose to target the lower abdomen and said she wasn't on any particular diet or added exercise in those 12 weeks.

It's a treatment that Poirer tells her friends is no longer her secret magic bullet.

"I had a $1,200 nap," Poirer said.

As for why you can't just take an ice block to your stomach to see results, is because you'd risk frost bite. CoolSculpting, which costs $1,200 as Poirer said, has the technology that allows the fat underneath the skin to freeze.