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Am I Too Young For A Facelift?

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the difference between male and female breast reduction surgeryIt is no secret that cosmetic procedures are becoming more popular with younger demographics than in previous years.  Social media and video conferencing have brought our appearance into greater focus, leading younger age groups, such as millennials, to change how they address signs of aging.  In years past, patients would wait until their 60s before considering cosmetic procedures such as traditional facelifts.  Now, when millennials notice the first signs of aging, they are keen to address them early on.  

Aging is not a one size fits all process.  Everyone ages differently, and many factors impact how quickly a person begins to show signs of aging.  Certainly, genetics plays a part, as does diet and exercise, sun damage, alcohol consumption, and smoking.  Where you are in the aging process will determine the procedure(s) best suited for your situation. 

If you are a young person in your late 20s and early 30s with proper skin care habits, you may be able to address the initial signs of aging with nonsurgical solutions.  Botox® and Dysport® as well as facial fillers are a great way to treat early signs of aging.  Every expression we make cause the muscles in our face to contract, and this repetitive movement leads to fine lines and wrinkles.  Additionally, our skin loses firmness as we age because our collagen production decreases.  We can treat fine lines and wrinkles with Botox® and Dysport® to help relax the muscles and prevent them from contracting.  We can then use facial fillers, such as Restylane® and Juvéderm® to fill in the gaps and restore volume.  These procedures take around 30 minutes with no downtime, so you can return to regular activity quickly.

Another great nonsurgical option is Band Aid Laser Skin Resurfacing.  Laser skin resurfacing works by encouraging collagen production in your skin.  Collagen is the protein responsible for making skin firmer and smoother.  Using this treatment, we are able to encourage new collagen production which will reduce fine lines and wrinkles, diminish scarring and freckles, and treat sun damage.  You will be left with a smoother complexion and a more youthful appearance.  My Band Aid Laser Skin Resurfacing procedure is performed in-office with gentle numbing, making the procedure easy and comfortable.  Generally, you can expect a recovery period of about two weeks. 

Once you enter your 40s you may want to consider surgical options.  I have a line of Band Aid Facelift procedures that aim to provide patients with the ability to treat aging in incremental stages.  My Band Aid Mini Facelift and Band Aid Micro Mini Facelift procedures are unique because they produce a very natural, subtle change and are performed in-office with gentle numbing.  As a result, these procedures are less invasive than traditional facelifts, leading to less swelling and bruising, shorter recovery time, lower costs, and fewer complications.  The difference between these two procedures depends upon how much aging needs to be corrected.

My Band Aid Micro Mini Facelift is great for patients seeking to address early signs of aging subtly, or as maintenance between facelift procedures.  On the other hand, my Band Aid Mini Facelift may be a better option if you seek to correct more advanced signs of aging but are not yet ready for or wanting to do a traditional facelift.  Both procedures are great options for patients looking to address new signs of aging as they appear, leaving you with natural-looking results and a younger version of yourself. 

Of course, you are not forced to decide between laser, injectables, or surgical options.  Each of these procedures complements one another, and combining treatments can enhance and prolong results.

Millennials are discovering that utilizing cosmetic procedures sooner leads to a more graceful and natural-looking aging process.  So, asking the question “am I too young for a facelift?” really depends on you as an individual and where you are in the aging process.  This is a question best answered during an in-person consultation where I can better understand your cosmetic needs and goals and what concerns you desire to correct. So, schedule a consultation with me, Dr. John LeRoy, at my Atlanta office.  I am happy to discuss the details of my Band Aid procedures with you and assist you in achieving your cosmetic goals.  For more information follow me on Facebook. 

Is It Time for Botox® or Dysport®? Top Signs to Look For

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Nonsurgical wrinkle treatmentsFor many people, Botox® or Dysport® injections are one of the first treatments they receive to reduce signs of aging. While it is a low-risk, minimally invasive, brief procedure, it can still feel like a leap of faith for patients who have never had professional facial rejuvenation treatments or those who have only had mild skin treatments like chemical peels. How do you know when you’re ready for Botox® or Dysport® injections?

As a double board-certified plastic surgeon who specializes in facial rejuvenation, I have helped many patients ease the anxiety of their first injection appointment. While wrinkle reduction injections and other cosmetic treatments should be an entirely personal decision, there are a few signs that indicate you may be ready for Botox® or Dysport®.

You Have Crow’s Feet in the Corners of Your Eyes

Among the first signs of aging that tend to appear are wrinkles called crow’s feet. These lines start in the outer corners of your eyes and extend outward.

Crow’s feet develop as the result of making the same facial expressions for decades. Over time, your muscles become tense and create a wrinkle in your skin. Botox® or Dysport® can ease these wrinkles by relaxing those tensed muscles for months at a time.

You’ve Developed Persistent Forehead Lines

When you raise your eyebrows or tense your forehead, you see horizontal wrinkles across your forehead. In the same way crow’s feet develop, these forehead lines occur because your forehead muscles eventually become tense in a prolonged way so that you have wrinkles even when your facial expression is neutral. Botox® or Dysport® injections can smooth these lines to give you a more youthful appearance.

You’re Noticing Frown Lines When You Aren’t Frowning

When you frown and furrow your brow, you’ll notice that vertical lines appear between your eyebrows. As with crow’s feet and forehead lines, though, for many people, these wrinkles eventually reach a point when they don’t fade after you stop frowning. This can make you look older and you may appear irritable or unhappy when you aren’t.

If you have noticed these persistent frown lines, Botox® or Dysport® injections are the ideal way to ease them for several months with each treatment. These injections will relax the targeted muscles to give you a more positive and refreshed look.

You’re Looking for a Minimally Invasive Way to Reduce Wrinkles

There are many treatments and procedures available today to reduce wrinkles, but they each have their own pros and cons and are ideal for different types of wrinkles. If you want a way to reduce expression lines with a quick and simple treatment that is minimally invasive and requires no time off work to recover, Botox® or Dysport® injections are likely a good fit.

You Want a Way to Minimize Future Wrinkles

The best way to treat aging is to prevent it as much as possible. Botox® and Dysport® injections have a unique advantage of slowing the development of expression lines. Expression lines appear because the facial muscles become progressively more tensed after years of repeated facial movements. Botox® and Dysport® relax these muscles for months with a single treatment. During that time, not only are your wrinkles smoother but because the muscles aren’t contracting, they aren’t making your expression lines worse. This is why many younger adults are starting Botox® or Dysport® injections even before they have significant wrinkles

Beginning Your Botox® or Dysport® Treatments

If you can identify with the signs above, you may be ready to start using Botox® or Dysport® injections to enjoy a more youthful, refreshed appearance in a non-surgical, minimally invasive way. To learn more and decide whether Botox® or Dysport® injections may be right for you, schedule a consultation with me, Dr. John LeRoy. For more insights, follow me on Facebook.

Why Cosmetic Facial Injections Are Popular Among Younger Patients

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female-checkes-eyes-in-mirrorCosmetic facial injections like Botox®, Dysport®, and facial fillers, by and large, are thought of as treatments to reduce signs of aging. They do an excellent job of this, and that’s why they’re so common among people in their 40s, 50s, and up who are fighting back against the cosmetic symptoms of aging that have already appeared.

It surprises many people to learn, though, that these cosmetic facial injections are also increasingly popular among younger patients, including those in their 20s and early 30s who have few (if any) visible signs of aging. Let’s look at the top reasons why these younger patients are opting for Botox®, Dysport®, and fillers.

Preventing Future Wrinkles

In general, millennials today are showing a greater interest in prevention compared to previous generations did at their age, and that extends to preventing signs of aging. Botox® and Dysport® are excellent preventative treatments to keep future signs of aging from setting in.

When you make the same facial expressions repeatedly over the years, your skin will crease in those areas and the facial muscles in these areas become more rigid, staying in a partially contracted state. This causes fine lines and eventually deeper wrinkles in certain facial areas. Botox® and Dysport® relax those tensed facial muscles, and while this smooths existing wrinkles, it also keeps you from overusing those muscles over and over for months at a time so you’re less likely to develop wrinkles in the future.

Filling In Facial Hollows at a Younger Age

Facial hollows like deep divots under your eyes or hollows in your cheeks are often the result of aging. As the years go by, you lose facial fat from certain areas and your skin becomes thinner as well.

Not all facial hollows come from aging, though. Some people naturally have less facial volume under their eyes leading to persistent dark circles, for example. Genetics, weight fluctuations, and more can create unwanted changes in your facial structure. A skilled and experienced board-certified plastic surgeon, particularly a plastic surgeon specializing in facial procedures, can use fillers like Restylane®, Juvederm®, and Radiesse® to sculpt the facial contour for young patients.

Enhancing the Lips

Full, plump lips are a popular standard of beauty. Some people have naturally thin lips due to genetics, and other people have noticed their lips getting thinner with age. Facial filler injections are giving countless younger patients the full lips they want in addition to helping older patients restore the plumper lips of their youth. Cosmetic facial injections can also be used to make uneven lips more symmetrical at nearly any age.

Making Minor Facial Tweaks

Facial fillers, Botox®, and Dysport® are rather versatile tools for making many types of facial tweaks. The contraction and relaxation of facial muscles affect many aspects of your appearance, so Botox® and Dysport® can be used for younger patients to raise and adjust the shape of their brows, tweak the curvature of the lips, or slim a muscular jawline, for example. Facial fillers can be used for other subtle adjustments too like curling the corners of the lips upward, adjusting the shape of the “cupid’s bow” at the top of the upper lip, tweaking the shape of the nose, and slightly changing the contour of the chin.

Choosing Your Provider for Cosmetic Facial Injections

Every day, more and more young adults are discovering that some of their top cosmetic frustrations can be temporarily solved with cosmetic facial injections, and understandably, that is an exciting prospect. However, don’t rush to the first person you find who offers Botox®, Dysport®, or facial filler injections. These injections are medical procedures that need to be done in a precise and safe way that only comes from training and expertise, so only trust a qualified and experienced medical professional in a sterile facility.

To find out if cosmetic facial injections can accomplish your cosmetic goals, schedule a consultation with me, Dr. John LeRoy. Follow me on Facebook for more plastic surgery insights and tips.

Looking Younger for the Holidays: Cosmetic Facial Injections

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botox injections, cosmetic procedures for face, wrinkle reduction, difference between botox and dysport, how to fade forehead wrinklesThis fall seems to be flying by, and with Thanksgiving around the corner, the holiday season is already nipping at our heels. As excited as we all are to celebrate and spend a joyous time with our friends and families, many people are also anxious about looking their best. After all, the holidays are a perfect time to snap pictures of the entire family together.

If you’re looking for a way to give yourself a more youthful look before the holidays arrive, you’re not out of time. Cosmetic facial injections like Botox® or Dysport® and facial fillers such as Restylane®, Juvéderm®, and Radiesse® are among the fastest-acting treatments for facial rejuvenation, and if you want to smooth some wrinkles before the holidays, these are likely to be your best option.

As a double board-certified plastic surgeon who has helped thousands of patients look younger and more refreshed with cosmetic facial injections, I’m happy to help you understand your options.

How Different Types of Cosmetic Facial Injections Can Help You Look Younger

There are two general categories of cosmetic facial injections: wrinkle relaxers or neuromodulators like Botox® and Dysport®, and facial fillers. Either of them can be very effective (or a combination of both of them), but they each have their own uses.

Neuromodulators like Botox® and Dysport® are ideal for wrinkles that form because of tensed facial muscles. When you make repeated facial expressions over the course of years, like squints, frowns, and raised eyebrows, the muscles that create these expressions are contracting so often that they eventually stay in a semi-contracted state. When that happens, it pinches your skin into a wrinkle, much like the lines you see when you make those facial expressions.

This is particularly common in the form of crow’s feet, frown lines between the eyebrows, and lines across the forehead from raised eyebrows or surprised expressions. Botox® and Dysport® temporarily relax those tensed facial muscles, allowing the skin above it to smooth out and the wrinkle to fade or disappear.

Facial fillers, on the other hand, are meant for a different cause of wrinkles: a loss of volume and firmness in the skin. Fillers like Restylane® and Juvéderm® use a material called hyaluronic acid to replace this lost volume. This “fills in” wrinkles, hollow regions, and thinning areas and gives your skin a smoother, more youthful look.

There are also fillers like Radiesse® which start out similar to traditional fillers by using synthetic material to replace youthful facial volume. But Radiesse® also contains a specialized ingredient that drives your body to produce more collagen – the protein that makes young skin firm and wrinkle-free. This leads to longer-lasting results: up to two years compared to the six to twelve months that most facial fillers last.

When Should I Schedule My Cosmetic Facial Injections for the Holidays?

If you want to look your best when the holidays arrive, when should you schedule your cosmetic facial injections? It depends on the injections you’re receiving.

Botox® and Dysport® both start showing results about two days after your injections. You. May have some minor redness and bruising for a few days. The results gradually improve, reaching their full potential within 30 days of your treatment. Those results typically last for about three months.

The timeline is a bit different with facial fillers. Because traditional fillers are using an injectable gel to restore your facial volume, you’ll see results instantly when the fillers are injected. However, you may have some redness, swelling, and bruising in the first few days after your procedure, so your final results will be visible after those effects have faded.

With Radiesse®, you’ll also see immediate results that will be fully visible after your bruising and swelling fade. The collagen growth, though, begins to be noticeable about three months after your injection and will continue for about two years.

Getting Ready for the Holidays with Cosmetic Facial Injections

Now is the perfect time to start preparing for the holidays with your cosmetic facial injections. To discuss your options and schedule your quick and simple treatment, call my plastic surgery office today. Be sure to follow me on Facebook and Twitter for more plastic surgery and facial rejuvenation insights.

Tips to Maintain Your Band Aid Mini Facelift Results

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smiling-female-faceAs a double board-certified plastic surgeon, I’ve been performing my signature Band Aid Mini Facelift for nearly 25 years now. Even after all that time, I never get tired of seeing how excited my patients are when they begin to see their results. For many of them, it refreshes their self-confidence in an incredibly meaningful way.

It’s important to remember, though, that no cosmetic surgery can prevent future aging, so you will eventually see new wrinkles and skin laxity. While your Band Aid Mini Facelift can repair a lot of the past damage that aging has done, there are steps you can take to minimize future aging and help your mini facelift results last longer. Incorporate these helpful tips after your surgery.

Make Lifestyle Changes for Your Skin’s Health

Youthful skin is healthy skin. There are many lifestyle habits that affect your overall health, and that includes your skin health.

First, drink plenty of water to keep your body and your skin hydrated. Second, exercise on a regular basis to promote healthy blood flow, which brings essential oxygen to your skin. Third, avoid nicotine because it constricts your blood vessels and reduces your natural supply of skin-firming collagen. Fourth, only drink alcohol in moderation because alcohol dries your skin, which can amplify signs of aging.

Turn Sun Protection into a Daily Routine

Sun protection is typically the most important step you can take to minimize skin aging (before or after your Band Aid Mini Facelift). Too much sun exposure will break down the collagen in your skin that makes the skin firm and smooth. Sun exposure also creates age spots, which actually have nothing to do with age – they’re overly-pigmented spots that come directly from sun damage.

To minimize your sun exposure, make sunscreen a part of your morning routine. If you want the aesthetics of a tan, choose sunless tanning options like a professional spray tan or airbrush tan or at-home self-tanning products. Remember to also wear sunglasses when you’re out in the sun, as this will help to protect the delicate and aging-prone skin around your eyes.

Optimize Your Skin Care Routine at Home

Along with lifestyle habits, your home skincare routine plays a vital role in your skin’s health and its aging. There are plenty of products available to reduce signs of aging, including serums, retinol products, night creams, and more. Don’t neglect the essentials of cleansing and moisturizing, though, because these help to keep your skin healthy.

Incorporate Non-Surgical Anti-Aging Treatments

All the other tips above will help you slow the aging process, but they can’t stop it entirely. New signs of aging will inevitably arise, and if you want to maintain a youthful look over the years, you can use non-surgical treatments to address these cosmetic concerns before you reach the point of needing a new mini facelift.

The most popular treatments to reduce signs of aging are cosmetic injectables, like Botox® or Dysport® and facial fillers like Restylane® and Juvederm®. These injections smooth away specific wrinkles temporary. Another popular choice is Band Aid Laser Skin Resurfacing, which reduces age spots, fine lines and wrinkles, and mild skin laxity by rebuilding collagen.

Getting the Longest-Lasting Results from Your Band Aid Mini Facelift

One of the most important facts for any Band Aid Mini Facelift patient to know is that giving you a youthful look is a team effort. It works best when you and I work together to not only create the best possible surgical results but also develop a plan to sustain your results for longer. To learn more or to create your anti-aging team, schedule a mini facelift consultation at my Atlanta office. Remember to follow me on Facebook and Twitter for more plastic surgery tips.

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