Peculiarities of Dermal Fillers – Part I

Dermal fillers help fill thin lines and wrinkles and are well suited for smoothing the furrow on the forehead, eliminating wrinkles around the mouth and giving the skin a fresh, younger look. The injections usually take only a few minutes, are painless and cause only a slight tingling and redness. Most patients see a sharp difference before and after treatment. Those injections can be used in different facial compartments at once to restore volume and eliminate wrinkles.

Popular method

In case of a decision to use dermal filler, perhaps the most important is the choice of the dermal filler agent. For the reason, that with a number of advantages, there are also disadvantages: some people may have an allergic reaction to synthetic compounds. In the case of an incorrect injection, there may be “bumps” or uneven skin texture. One of the biggest drawbacks of these dermal fillers is that the results are only temporary or semi-permanent, since the fillers are absorbed by the body for 12 to 18 months. So, new injections are required to maintain the result.

Currently, there is a large number of dermal fillers types, with different validity (from 6 months to 5 years), with its own level of effectiveness, deficiencies and indications regarding usage. Each manufacturer produces several types of this medicine in terms of density, so they use to be injected into different levels and into different zones: superficial, medial, deep and almost periostic (the densest).

Areas of usage

Talking about density of zones it might be useful to indicate popular parts of the face and body for the injections of fillers:

• Rejuvenation of the area around the eyes and lips
• Necessary shaping of the nose
• Increasing volume of the cheek
• Correction of the cheekbones shape
• Simulation of chin lines and its volume
• Lip augmentation
• Neck rejuvenation
• Correction of the shape of hands and feet
• Modeling of buttocks.

Types of filler’s agent material

The first material to handle skin defects was fat. Then research moved to biodegradable materials (decomposable, absorbable) such as collagen and hyaluronic acid, and to bionondegradable (permanent) materials. At present, the list of biodegradable, weakly degradable and permanent dermal fillers is very unclear. It is necessary to understand which of the fillers is for replacing (e.g. for wrinkles) or which is for stimulation (volume recovery by causing collagen secretion), and they, in turn, can be both divided as weakly biodegradable and permanent.