For a lot of people living with eczema, dermatitis, rosacea or topical steroid withdrawal, the goal was never perfect skin. It was comfort. It was a day without the itch. It was getting dressed without thinking about it first.
If that is where you are, you have probably also reached the point where every new product feels like one more thing to be disappointed by. So before we tell you what CAP Therapy is, here is what it is not. It is not a reset button, it is not a cure, and it is not a reason to stop the care you already have in place with your doctor.
What it may be is a different kind of support for skin that has been stuck.
What is CAP therapy?
CAP stands for Cold Atmospheric Plasma. Plasma is the fourth state of matter, after solid, liquid and gas. When you add enough energy to a gas, some of its particles become electrically charged, and it starts behaving differently. That is plasma.
A CAP device passes a small electrical charge through ordinary air, which is mostly nitrogen and oxygen, and creates a controlled plasma at the tip of a handpiece. As that plasma meets your skin it delivers a mix of short-lived reactive oxygen and nitrogen species, sometimes shortened to RONS. Those molecules are the active part of the treatment.
At Sol Studio, CAP Therapy is delivered using Dr Platon plasma technology.
Why the word “cold” matters
Cold atmospheric plasma is designed to stay below 40°C. In practice the skin sits at roughly 37 to 38°C during treatment, which is close to your own body temperature. There is no thermal injury, no controlled wounding, and no downtime built into the process.
That distinction is the whole reason we can use it on skin that could not tolerate a peel, a laser or needling. When a barrier is already broken, the last thing it needs is another injury to heal from.
What CAP Therapy may help with
Research into cold plasma in dermatology is still young, and most of it sits at pilot-study scale. With that honestly on the table, published human trials and laboratory work suggest CAP may be able to:
- reduce Staphylococcus aureus on the skin surface, the bacteria that commonly overgrows on eczema-prone skin
- disrupt bacterial biofilms, the protective layer bacteria build around themselves
- support the skin’s own repair response, including keratinocyte and fibroblast activity
- calm the visible signs of inflammation, including redness
- briefly increase how well the skin takes up what is applied straight afterwards
You will notice the word “may” doing a lot of work in that list. That is deliberate, and it is the honest state of the science.
What the research actually shows
We would rather you heard this from us than from a brochure.
Eczema and atopic dermatitis
The strongest signal so far comes from a 2021 pilot study of 22 people with mild to moderate atopic dermatitis, published in Scientific Reports. Each person had CAP applied to a lesion on one side of the body and a sham treatment on the other, three sessions across two weeks. The CAP-treated side improved significantly on every severity score used, including itch. The proportion of S. aureus in the skin microbiome dropped from around 23% to 10% on the treated side, while the untreated side barely moved. No serious side effects were reported.
Rosacea and acne
A small randomised pilot in 12 people with rosacea found reduced redness and improved quality-of-life scores after daily 90-second treatments over 6 to 12 weeks. A separate randomised trial in 34 people with mild acne found a reduction in inflammatory lesions.
Where it did not work
In a randomised trial of 46 people treating itch, CAP performed no better than the argon gas control. Both improved equally. That result belongs in this article as much as the others do.
So: promising, consistent in direction, and genuinely early. Small samples, different devices, different protocols. Anyone telling you cold plasma is proven is ahead of the evidence.
What a CAP session at Sol Studio is like
A CAP Therapy appointment runs 45 minutes. Your skin is cleansed, then the handpiece is passed slowly over the areas being treated. Most people describe a faint tingle, a slight warmth, and a smell a bit like fresh air after a thunderstorm, which is the ozone.
There is no numbing, no downtime and no peeling afterwards. You can go back to work. Some people notice their skin feels calmer the same day, and some notice nothing for several sessions, which is normal and does not mean it is not working.
Because CAP briefly makes the skin more receptive, what goes on immediately afterwards is chosen carefully. That part is not an upsell, it is part of the treatment.
CAP inside our Combination Facial Therapy
CAP is no longer only something you book on its own. It is now built into our level 2 and 3 Combination Facial Therapy, which means it reaches people who came to us for something other than eczema or withdrawal.
In clinic we are seeing it used for acne, reactive skin, pigmentation and dermatitis. Those are clinical observations rather than trial results, and we will keep being clear about the difference, but they are consistent with what the published research suggests CAP does to inflammation and to the skin’s repair response.
How many sessions will I need?
It depends on the condition, how long it has been going on, and what else is happening in your life and your body. As a general shape, compromised or inflamed skin usually starts with a course of treatments spaced close together, often twice weekly, then moves to a maintenance rhythm as things stabilise.
We would rather map that out properly than sell you a number over the phone. That is what the Skin Discovery Session is for.
Who CAP Therapy may not be right for
CAP is generally not suitable if you have a pacemaker or another implanted electrical device, and it is not used over active skin cancer or undiagnosed lesions. If you are pregnant, breastfeeding, or being actively treated by a dermatologist, tell us before we plan anything.
None of that is a reason not to ask. It is a reason to ask properly.
Where to find CAP Therapy in New Zealand
Access to cold atmospheric plasma in New Zealand is still limited. Sol Studio offers CAP Therapy from our Mount Maunganui studio at 19 Hibiscus Ave, a short drive from central Tauranga and within reach of Pāpāmoa, Te Puke, Katikati, Whakatāne and the wider Bay of Plenty.
Clients regularly travel to us for it, and if you are further afield we are happy to talk through whether the travel is worth it for your particular skin before you commit to anything.
Where to go next
- CAP Therapy for eczema and dermatitis, including what staph and biofilms have to do with skin that will not settle
- CAP Therapy and topical steroid withdrawal, an honest look at what it may and may not do
- Three client journeys, with real timeframes attached
Common questions about CAP Therapy
Skin support, not skin warfare
Your skin is not something to fight. Whether you are dealing with steroid withdrawal, eczema, rosacea or a barrier that will not hold, the work is the same: understand what is actually happening, then create the conditions for your skin to do its own job.
CAP Therapy is one tool for that. A good one, and an early one. If you would like to know whether it fits your skin, that conversation is the place to start.
Start with understanding, not another treatment
A Skin Discovery Session is part consultation, part mini facial, and a proper look at what has been keeping your skin stuck.
Book a Skin Discovery Session