Can Botox Help Sternocleidomastoid Spasms After Facelift?

Dear Carol99,


To see if Botox would work, you can try local anesthetic, maybe something longer acting (8-12 hours) like Marcaine (bupivicaine)

Local anesthetic can act like a short term Botox to relax muscles

This would give you a little window to see if Botox would work before committing yourself to the cost and 3 months of potential side effects


Best regards,

Nima Shemirani

   Botox or one of its variants has been used to treat cervical dystonia or spasmodic torticollis for years.  This may have applicability in your case.

Occasional patients can experience irritation of muscles following facelifts and these issue nearly always resolve with time.  If the spasms continue to be problematic, some Botox can be helpful.  Make sure your surgeon is familiar with this treatment, but know that over time, this will VERY likely get better on its own.

Botox is commonly used for muscle spasms and in fact had therapeutic indication for this prior to its cosmetic approval.  This is  a fairly easy injection and may well help - I have injected this area in several patients for spasm after they were involved in a MVA with good results.  The only "common" side effect at the doses you would need for this would be a possible weakness that you would notice on the side of the injection, but none of the patients I have injected have noticed this.

Yikes!  I'd be careful with this idea if I were you.  The doses that neurologists use to soften the activity of major muscles are much greater than we use in the delicate muscles of facial expression.  With greater dosages come greater (and much more serious) complications.  I'd be inclined to try gentler methods.