Lips are still the rage in beauty and at Valentine there is nothing more alluring than beautiful red lips! Read on to what Dr. Angela Sturm is telling us about the newest trends in giving out some awesome lip service!
As talk shows and online sites are talking about trends in facial plastic surgery going forward the questions have been asked if women were still interested in breast implants, lip fillers, being the most popular?! The general consensus that I’ve heard is that yes, they are still happening, though they seem to be less prevalent in the limelight, but the difference is that they are smaller, more proportioned and less obvious.
Below, Dr. Angela Sturm has given us her take on Lip Fillers and beyond and the options available and most popular at this time to give a more natural look to fuller lips……
Soft tissue fillers to the lips can be very pretty and natural. Trust me there are people that have had lip injections that you have no idea. Unfortunately, that procedure has received some negative attention due to variable outcomes with people getting over-injected or injected in a way that is too obvious. So, many people want to restore the volume that they used to have, but want other options, as well.
Luckily there are a few! There are many, many products on the market to plump the lips. Most act by hydrating the lips. Of course, dehydrated lips, look smaller and have more fine lines, so hydrating them with hyaluronic acid, like the Skin Medica HA lip plumper. I personally can’t tell that my lips look any plumper, but they are more moisturized and feel softer with this product.
Lip lifts are becoming more popular. There are a number of different ways to do the procedure. The most common is with a small incision below the nose. The biggest concern most people have with lip lifts is that the incision not be visible. If a straight incision is used below the nose, it can be. Therefore, I use an incision that is hidden in the nostrils and around the sides, so it’s not visible. With this technique the distance between the nose and the top of the lip, that lengthens with age, is shortened. There is more “red lip” showing, so the lip looks more plump and there is more “tooth show”. With time, people notice that less of their teeth are visible with talking and smiling. A lip lift restores the youthful appearance of the patient’s mouth. This can be done in the office with local anesthesia or with IV sedation for comfort.
Lip advancements can move some of the mucosa inside the mouth towards the lips. This creates more fullness of the lips and can be done on the top, bottom or both lips. There are no visible incisions, since they are inside the mouth. This also can be done either with local or IV sedation.
Lip implants are available, but I am not a fan. I have seen them feel hard, be visible and extrude (come out of the skin). A better option is acellular dermis, for people who have tried soft tissue fillers and like them, but want something that lasts longer. Acellular dermis is an engineered sheet of the matrix of the dermis without the cellular components. So, none of the components that your body would react to, but a matrix that your tissue integrates into to create more volume. This lasts between 5-10 years when the natural aging process overcomes that fullness. Fat grafting can be used in the lips, but be cautious. The lip skin is thin, so can show any irregularity and how much of the fat that will live varies from person to person and surgeon to surgeon.
So many options! Always so great to hear from an expert I know I can trust.