Most Chicago clinics sell laser hair removal in packages of six. For women with polycystic ovary syndrome, that number is often wrong before the first appointment is even booked. We sat down with Valeria Tartacovschi, cofounder of a laser hair removal studio in Old Town, to talk about why hormonal hair behaves differently under a laser, what an honest session estimate looks like, and where the package model quietly fails the people who need the treatment most.
Why Laser Hair Removal Is Sold in Packages of Six
Let’s start with the packages. Why is six the number everyone advertises?
Valeria Tartacovschi: Because six is true for a lot of people. For a client with dark, coarse hair and no hormonal condition, six to eight sessions gets her to somewhere around 80 to 90 percent reduction, and she is genuinely finished. Six is a fair average, so six is what gets printed on the menu.
The problem is that averages are built from everyone, and PCOS clients are the ones sitting furthest from the middle. When someone with PCOS buys a six-pack because that is the option on the board, she has bought about half of what she actually needs. Then session six arrives, there is still hair, and she assumes the laser didn’t work on her. It did work. She just ran out of sessions in the middle of her series.
How Many Brazilian Laser Sessions PCOS Actually Takes
So what is the real number?
For our Brazilian clients with PCOS it is usually eight to twelve, plus a touch-up or two a year after that. Same for clients with a mix of fine and coarse hair, and for deeper skin tones where we treat at a more measured pace. I want to be careful here, because eight to twelve is still an estimate and I cannot give anyone a number without looking at their skin and their hair. But it is a far more honest starting point than six, and we say it at the consultation rather than at session five when the client is frustrated.
We publish our Brazilian pricing and session expectations in full, including what happens if you need a seventh or eighth appointment, on our page for Brazilian laser hair removal in Chicago. A single session is $225. Three are $600 and six are $1,150, and if you need a ninth you book it on its own at the single-session rate. Nobody gets locked into buying another block of six to finish.
Why PCOS Hair Responds Differently Under a Laser
Why does PCOS change the math? Hair is hair.
Not quite. Androgens are what turn fine, barely visible hair into thick terminal hair, and they do it in specific places. The pubic area, the inner thighs, the buttocks, the face. That is exactly the map of a Brazilian, which is why this area is the one PCOS clients ask about most.
Two things follow from that. The hair is denser and coarser than average, so there is simply more of it to clear. And the hormonal signal that produced it is still switched on. A laser can disable a follicle permanently, and the follicles we treat do not come back. What a laser cannot do is stop your endocrine system from recruiting new follicles that were previously dormant. So you are clearing existing hair while a system behind it keeps promoting fine hair into coarse hair.
That is not a reason to skip the treatment. It is a reason to expect maintenance rather than a finish line.
Is Laser Hair Removal Worth It With PCOS
Is the laser still worth it, then, if the hair keeps being recruited?
For most of our PCOS clients, yes, and by a wide margin. Shaving a full Brazilian every day or two when the hair is that dense is miserable, and waxing that area monthly for years is how people end up with folliculitis and ingrown hairs. We saw a lot of that before laser was common. After a full series most clients go from daily shaving to a touch-up session once or twice a year. The improvement is real even when the word “permanent” needs an asterisk.
What I will not do is sell it to someone it cannot help. The laser only sees pigment. White, gray, blonde and red hair do not respond, and if the hair is too light to show up clearly in a photo, it is too light for the machine. Some PCOS clients have a mix, coarse dark hair in some spots and fine light hair in others. We treat what the laser can treat and we tell them plainly what it will leave behind. That conversation happens at the consultation, not after they have paid.
Where Medical Treatment for PCOS Fits Alongside Laser
Should a PCOS client be seeing a doctor alongside this?
Ideally, yes, and I say this to every client who tells me she has PCOS or suspects she does. Laser is a hair treatment. It does nothing for the irregular cycles, the insulin resistance, or anything else going on underneath. Hirsutism is one of the more common reasons women with PCOS get diagnosed at all, and there are medical routes that address the hormonal driver directly. Those belong to an endocrinologist or a gynecologist, not to me.
The two work well together, though. If the hormonal driver is being managed, there is less new recruitment happening between appointments, and each laser session has less new work to do.
How Far Apart Brazilian Laser Sessions Need to Be
Walk me through the spacing. Does a longer series mean a longer calendar?
It does, and people underestimate this part. A follicle has to be in its growth phase for the laser to reach the root, and at any given moment only about 15 to 20 percent of the hair in that area qualifies. The rest is resting or in transition and the laser passes right over it. That is the whole reason one session cannot do the job, for anyone.
We book every four to six weeks early in the series, then stretch to six or eight weeks later once regrowth slows. At eight to twelve sessions, you are looking at a commitment that runs well past a year. If somebody comes back at ten or twelve weeks because life happened, nothing is lost. Hair that is gone stays gone. That visit just catches fewer growing follicles, and it may add one appointment at the end.
The avoidable version of a long series is inconsistency. Stretching every gap, waxing between sessions, showing up with a fresh tan. Waxing is the one that frustrates me most, because it pulls out the root the laser needs to find, and clients often do it right before an appointment thinking they are being helpful.
How Skin Tone and Laser Wavelength Change the Session Count
You mentioned skin tone affecting the count. How much does the machine matter?
More than almost anything else. We run a GentleMax Pro Plus, which has two wavelengths in one platform: a 755nm Alexandrite for Fitzpatrick I through III and a 1064nm Nd:YAG for olive, brown and Black skin. On deeper skin the Nd:YAG is the safe choice, but it is slightly less efficient at the follicle, so an extra session or two is normal. That is a trade I will take every time over the alternative.
The alternative is a single-wavelength diode, which is what a lot of discount chains use, and on melanin-rich skin it can cause dark spots, light spots or burns. Any clinic should be able to tell you which wavelength they plan to use on you and why. If the answer is vague, that tells you something.
We have been working out of the same Old Town studio since 2018, and laser hair removal is what we do all day, every day. That focus is part of why V&P Laser Hair Removal & Skin Care can price a Brazilian at $225 when most medspas in the city are between $350 and $650 for the same area on the same laser.
What a PCOS Brazilian Laser Series Looks Like, Session by Session
What does a realistic PCOS series actually look like from the client’s side?
The first two sessions, treated hairs shed over one to three weeks and what grows back is slower and softer. By three or four, bare patches appear and shaving drops off. Five and six, most of the area stays smooth between visits. For a non-PCOS client that is close to the end. For a PCOS client that is roughly the midpoint, and I think knowing that in advance is most of what separates a client who is happy at session eight from one who feels cheated at session six.
Then maintenance. Once or twice a year for most people, and more around anything that shifts hormones. Starting or stopping birth control, perimenopause, pregnancy. Dormant follicles wake up, a single session puts it back, and that is the ongoing shape of it rather than a problem to solve.
What to Ask at a Laser Hair Removal Consultation
Last one. What do you wish PCOS clients asked at consultations?
How many sessions you think I will need, and what happens if I need more than the package. Those two questions expose almost everything about how a clinic operates. If the answer to the first is six for everybody regardless of what is in front of them, the estimate is coming off a price list rather than off your skin.
And ask what happens at the end of the series. I tell clients when they are done. If six is enough for you, you are done at six, and I am not going to invent a seventh appointment.
Priya Nair, MPH, is a certified wellness coach and former hospital dietitian with 12 years of translating public-health research into everyday habits. She joined us in 2024 to deliver evidence-based guidance on nutrition, stress relief, and holistic fitness that fits busy schedules. Off the mat, Priya practices yoga, hikes coastal trails, and tests plant-forward recipes for weekend potlucks with friends and neighbors.
