BOTOX Therapy
We offer BOTOX injections that will rid your face of crow's feet, forehead lines, or frown lines. BOTOX is a powerful medicine used to treat facial expression lines and neck banding as well as down-turned smiles and drooping eyes. Best of all, the procedure takes just a minute. This has become our most popular cosmetic procedure because it is safe and patients love the results.
What is BOTOX
Botulism is food poisoning produced by a bacteria. BOTOX is a medicine produced by the same bacteria. BOTOX is not alive but is a protein that weakens and inactivates muscles. This is another example where natural products are used for medicinal purposes: fungi produce penicillin, cowpox virus protects against smallpox, foxglove plant produces the "poison" digitalis that millions of patients take daily for heart disease. Now with bioengineering it is common for bacteria to produce the necessary medicine for a specific disease.
Safety
While BOTOX is potent medicine in high concentration, it is used in very small quantities with high margins of safety. After a muscle is injected, its first effects are not seen for 24 hours and the complete effect on the muscle will not be complete for two weeks. Fifty units (one half vial) or less of BOTOX per session is generally used. To have toxic effects on a patient, over 2,000 units (costing $6,000) would have to be injected at one time. BOTOX effects are attracted only to muscles, and it has no effect on the central nervous system or on the body if injected accidentally into a nerve or blood vessel. BOTOX is also safe because complete recovery of the muscle is possible. Recovery is due to the body's excellent ability to form new fibers that allow activation of the muscles.
The Cosmetic Use Of BOTOX
Cosmetic BOTOX injections were pioneered in 1988 by a Vancouver ophthalmologist and her husband, a dermatologist. Since that time, this team of doctors has performed over 10,000 sessions on its patients. The ophthalmologist noted that the wrinkles disappeared in her patients with eyelid spasms who were treated with BOTOX. This led to further research, which confirmed the effectiveness and safety of the BOTOX vaccine for improving wrinkles due to overactive muscles of the face.
In 1996 at the annual meeting of The American Academy of Dermatology in Washington, a presentation by dermatologist Dr. Nicholas Lowe showed that BOTOX was useful for improving facial expression lines. Significant improvement was noted on both forehead frown lines and crow's-feet. No significant side effects were noted beyond the expected injection discomfort. For 30 patients only 1 experienced a mild drooping of the upper eyelid, which cleared spontaneously. The length of effective improvement for the forehead frown lines was approximately 18 weeks. The degree of improvement of the crow's-feet was generally less than the forehead frown lines. BOTOX is not 100% effective in all patients.
BOTOX For Crow's-Feet
Wrinkles radiating from the corner of the eyes caused by smiling, laughing, or squinting are especially distressing to some individuals. Previously, no reasonable medical or surgical solution improved this problem due to the strong underlying muscles. Even with the deepest chemical peels or laser resurfacing techniques, rapid recurrence of these lines around the eyes is inevitable. Now for best results, BOTOX injections are used in conjunction with resurfacing procedures. It is the function of BOTOX to prevent the recurrence of wrinkles by inhibiting the underlying muscles.
Nasolabial Folds
This area is not ideal for correction by the BOTOX method; it also presents a challenge in facelift surgery. This area is most dynamic when talking, smiling, and eating. As one ages, both muscle and fat are lost from this area. Replacement of fat is now possible, but the real advance in this area has been the development of a permanent filling agent with a high safety and satisfaction profile--Gortex. In addition the lips can be supplemented with these techniques. In summary, for the area involving the lips and around the mouth, BOTOX will not help this zone and is not recommended.