I previously had Juvéderm XC as the filler for my upper lip and I was very pleased with my results. This year I revisited Dr.Ha because his work is amazing, and I was very satisfied with my previous visit to his office. I originally wanted to get the Juvéderm XC again but that product is no longer offered. They’ve created a new softer injectable gel that gives a the filler a softer and smoother look and feel. It’s called JUVÉDERM VOLLURE. After discussing the product with the office and Dr. Ha, I went ahead and had that filler used for my upper lip. Of course there was a cost difference for a new and improved product. While the product was being injected it felt a slightly little more painful then I originally remembered. Also I had a little more bruising then before. The pain didn’t last much and the bruising cleared up within a few days. I’m loving my results as expected and this new product is set to last up to 18 months which is super exciting.
I have received Juvederm in the past for my lips and smile lines. I have done both xc and xc +. In my opinion, although the results don't last as long with xc, they outcome is more natural to me. I've also had radiesse injected into my midface area. As a teenager, I was very very thin from stress, as a result I lost all the fat in my face. Although I am healthy now, I wanted to restore my face's natural volume. I had a small upper lip in comparison to my lower, but about medium sized overall. I had 1/2- 3/4 of the syringe put in my upper lip, and the rest in my smile lines and a tiny bit under my eyebrows.When I got 1 whole syringe in the past it looked unnaturally large. The first time I got filler I went to a med spa RN. I was bruises severely for 3 weeks and it was lumpy. The next time I went to a Dr. Ha of Highly Artistic Surgery, and literally had no bruising even though I am anemic! He is amazing and won't let me over do it! Also amazing monthly specials and he got rid of my acne!
I wanted to have my upper lip to appear fuller. My lips are not proportion at all and when I wear lipstick I didn't achieve the full lip effect I wanted. Best decision I ever made. I just wish the result would last forever because I don't want to get a lip implant. Im going to continue to get the filler injectables, because I felt very comfortable with the procedure.
I'm a strong believer of trigger point concept in pain management; the same concept that guides the use of Botox in migraine headache. Here's my view of this concept: pain receiving center in your brain is like a cup of water that is fed by different water hoses. Each of the hose is a sensory nerve. When water in the cup reaches a threshold, pain will be felt through out all anatomical regions corresponding to these nerves endings. So, if we can find some easily accessed hoses (nerves) and shut them down, the cup level will drop below the threshold, and pain will resolve.So, when we use botox for headache, we inject the medication to several trigger points where some of the nerve endings are. In my experience, it takes at least 3-4 trigger point suppression to relieve the pain. If less than a required number of the trigger points were suppressed, my patient will feel the pain from the bigger "hoses" which are the nerves that receive the real pain signal from other body region.In cosmetic Botox, we tend to only hit one trigger point for headache (the gabella region), leaving many other point untreated. This is the reason for sudden surge in sensation of pain from other regions, usually temporal, TMJ, upper neck and upper back.For slight cases, nothing some Tylenol or Motrin won't help. In some severe cases, I took the patients back to the office and simply place some lidocaine (sometimes with Kenalog) to the other active trigger points. All pain usually resolves in a few seconds after injection.Acupuncture and massage therapy work similarly.
In general, where you have a wrinkle, you have a muscle running vertically to the wrinkle under the skin. So, in the forehead, there's a sheet of muscle (called frontalis) that runs from the hairline down and inserts to the skin under the eye brows. This muscles helps lifting the brow up, but it also causes the transverse forehead wrinkles.If too much Botox was placed to paralyze this muscle, then the brows would go down, and the skin below the brows would fall over the eyelid. This is likely the reason for you to loose the skin crease on top of your upper lash.Two options now for you: one is to simply let the Botox wear off, which may take several weeks or months. The second option is to consider putting some more Botox on the orbicularis which is the muscle that goes around the eye socket to pull down the brows. Relaxing this muscle sometimes helps lift the brows back up.If Botox in the orbicularis has already been placed without help, I sometimes consider doing a non-invasive brow lift with Ulthera or Radiofrequency. These takes times to get to final result, but during the first few weeks, some temporal lifting due muscular contraction can be beneficial.
