Don’t Let Smile Lines Compromise Your Beautiful Smile
Ready to do something about those laugh lines you’re noticing at the corners of your mouth? You have several options to treat them so they don’t detract from your beautiful smile.
As you age, you begin to develop fine lines and wrinkles in your face. You might wish this weren’t the case, but alas, there’s nothing you can do to stop the advance of age.
Or is there?
Thanks to the wonders of modern medicine, there are a number of techniques you can take advantage of to smooth out these wrinkles and keep your youthful appearance for as long as possible.
Two products used widely for this purpose are Botox® and Juvéderm®. Most people are treated with one or the other, but at Melanie L. Adams Dermatology in Columbia, Maryland, we think they’re the perfect anti-aging combination when used together. Here’s why:
Botox is in a class of injectables called neuromodulators that target wrinkles caused by repeated muscle contractions. When it’s injected, it softens the appearance of the wrinkles and fine lines by softening and relaxing the muscle contractions that caused the wrinkles in the first place.
Once deactivated, these muscles can’t make the same contractions they normally do, which helps correct the existing wrinkles and keep new ones from forming. The muscle relaxation lasts about four months, after which patients must get a new injection to maintain their results.
In contrast, Juvéderm is part of a different class of injectables called dermal fillers, which also help soften and smooth wrinkles, but these wrinkles are caused by a loss of facial volume, not by muscle contractions.
We lose volume in our faces as biological compounds like collagen and hyaluronic acid are depleted over time. These compounds are important because they give your skin its full, youthful presence.
Juvéderm helps restore these compounds to their natural levels in areas where wrinkles like crow’s feet and smile lines have formed. A Juvéderm treatment usually lasts 6-12 months.
Both Botox and Juvéderm are FDA-approved, but as you can see, they function differently, so they can’t be used interchangeably. Using them in concert with each other, though, provides complementary enhancements that keep your face looking young, balanced, and refreshed.
If we’re using Botox and Juvéderm to target different wrinkle areas on your face, we can do the treatments at the same time. If, however, we’re treating the same area with both substances, we need to schedule the appointments at different times for your safety and to get the best results.
If you want to explore the idea of using Botox and Juvéderm together as the perfect anti-aging combination, contact Dr. Adams by calling our office or using the convenient online scheduler to request an appointment.
