By the doctor Maxence Caillens
Following two years of lockdowns, we are finally free of masks and our mouths can once again express our emotions.
Our mission is to improve or beautify the lips, but never to transform them. Caucasians have a smaller upper lip than lower lip, whereas Asians and Africans have a more voluminous upper lip than lower lip. Reality TV, Instagram and social media have led to non-medical practitioners injecting and deforming people’s mouths using the Russian Lips method, creating a look that simply does not exist naturally, only in this online community. They denigrate our profession by defacing young women and causing complications that can sometimes be serious (blindness, necrosis), leading people to believe that these are the results of aesthetic medicine. It is our job to erase any unacceptable flaws and ensure the results blend in with the rest of the face, or even to enhance the beauty of the mouth if the request is legitimate.
There are a great many techniques for injecting the mouth area.
The most frequent request is to boost the prominence of the lips. One method used involves injecting into the body of lips using a cannula, but the downside of this method is that it can cause a “duck face” pout. We can also work by injecting a bolus on the inside of the lip in order to create a natural-looking projection, but this can cause the patient to feel nodules inside the lip. We can also inject into the vermillion border, which highlights the contour of the lips and enhances them.
Reshaping and highlighting the philtral columns which accentuates the cupid’s bow and enhances the natural shape of the mouth. But we must not forget that anything we do to the body of the lip, whether with a cannula or a needle, runs the risk of vascular effraction and its associated complications such as necrosis. We must therefore never neglect the anatomical position of the labial artery. To inject safely and achieve easily-reproducible results, IBSA Derma laboratory has developed, in collaboration with aesthetics doctors and surgeons, a protocol called “EGO Lips”.
The method uses a retro-tracing technique in the submucosa, which minimises the vascular risks. There are three levels to this protocol: “ESSENTIAL” in which there is no increase in volume, but rather hydration for a glossy effect, and the shape of the mouth is redefined. We inject ALIAXIN® FL, a medium-reticulated hyaluronic acid, in a retro-tracing pattern into the submucosa, in diagonal parallel lines that converge in the centre of the mouth.
“GLOBAL” adds volume and plumpness to the mouth, using a more volumising ALIAXIN® LV than the previous product, in vertical lines to open up and develop the lip, then mi- cro-droplets of ALIAXIN® FL in a retro-tracing pattern to hydrate the lips.
“OUTSTANDING” restructures the mouth in patients who want to really enhance their lips by improving their mouth’s definition, adding suitable volumes and improving or even creating a central cleft when the mouth is at rest.
With ALIAXIN® LV, the columns sit vertically underneath the cupid’s bow, but with the others they sit parallel and diagonal- ly out towards the corner of the mouth. The use of ALIAXIN® FL will be the same as before.
We therefore understand that, despite using the same products and following the same treatment plans, the direction and lines of force affect the final results.
There is therefore not just one method, but multiple methods for improving the mouth area, and it is down to the doctor, during their one-on-one consultation with the patient, to identify their real requirements and, like the artists we have to be, to use a palette of products coupled with the most suitable techniques in order to fulfil the patient’s wishes.
By the doctor Maxence Caillens
Ambassador, Physician Expert and KOL for IBSA Derma Laboratories
Physician Expert and Trainer for FILLMED Laboratories, for the ALMA LASER company, and MOSTLED company,
Member of the LED Academy and trainer in the diploma of the SOFMAA and the AMME, former official doctor of the French President. MD graduate of Paris VII university. Graduate of OXYOLOGIE Paris XIII University. More information on docteurcaillens.fr
