Have you ever wondered why more and more people are looking a bit or a lot strange? You kind of have to do a double take and see if you can figure out what’s going on. It’s happening more and more because of Botox and Fillers. This blog will be about Botox, a neurotoxin. There are other neurotoxins such as Dysport and Xeomin.
As you most likely know, Botox is used to relax the muscles of the forehead, between the eyes (what we call 11 lines), and crow’s feet. It is used for other things such as excessive sweating, migraines and excessive jaw clenching. The way a neurotoxin works is to block the transmission of signal from the nerve to the muscle. After treatment, it takes usually 3 to 5 days to see the results. It lasts for about 3 months, sometimes not as long or sometimes longer.
Most of the time, a person will see a nice response from the Botox treatment. What makes Botox tricky and why some people have bad results is a combination of factors. One obvious factor is that a lot of providers don’t understand the anatomy well enough to prevent altering the brow shape or lowering the brow. Another factor is that not enough or too much is injected. A lot of times, you don’t even know how much is being injected. Another factor is that some people are very sensitive and some people are not as sensitive. Some people have very strong movement of muscle. So, there are ways that we can control Botox effect by knowing the anatomy and minimize risk and use a reliable range of Botox units per area. The way we cannot control Botox is how someone may respond to the treatment because of increased or decreased sensitivity.
Botox is calculated in terms of units. It comes in 100 unit vials. Sterile saline is used to get the Botox into solution. Once the water is added to the vial, the Botox starts to lose its potency after about 10 days in the vial.
How Botox is injected and how much is used should be based on the location of the injection. When I inject between the eyes to treat the eleven lines, the injection is into the muscle. When I inject the forehead, I inject just under the skin. Why? Because injecting into the muscle could lead to complete block of the forehead muscle, called the frontalis. If you freeze the forehead muscle entirely, that will potentially make you look frozen or may make your brow feel heavy or, even worse, drop it down.
The more you know about any given treatment, the more you understand the complexities of that treatment. That is why you should always have the person injecting you go over all of these details, explaining not only benefits but risks as well.
You can go to my website and read more about Botox and other things by clicking on this link. The next blog will be about fillers.