New Technologies for Non-Surgical Facial Rejuvenation

One of the most important components of my job is to really listen to my patients. It is what allows me to devise the right treatment plan for your unique anatomy. But it also gives my colleagues and myself a clear view as to what is missing in terms of treatment options. As Board-Certified Plastic Surgeons and Dermatologists, our goal is to constantly be coming up with new technologies and innovations in order to deliver what patients want. And what you want are more non-surgical facial rejuvenation procedures.

Facial Aging Happens to Everyone

No one likes to witness the signs of facial aging such as:

• Fine lines & wrinkles
• Brown spots
• Redness
• “Crepey” skin texture
• Loose, sagging skin
• Jowling

Certain lifestyle choices like diet, exercise, sun exposure and whether or not you smoke may speed up the process, but facial aging happens to everyone. Thankfully, we offer an ever growing repertoire of non-surgical procedures for turning back the clock. Three of my favorite new technologies for non-surgical facial rejuvenation are:

• Microneedling with Radiofrequency
• Nanofat Injections
• Thread Lifts

Whats New in Microneedling with Radiofrequency?

I have been a huge advocate of microneedling since I first helped introduce it in this country in 1992. This has given me a front row seat to its many advancements, one of the most revolutionary being combining microneedling with radiofrequency (RF) energy. At the Boston Center for Plastic Surgery, we have long offered our patients Profound, a microneedling/RF procedure to improve both skin tone and skin texture in a single session. The reason that Profound is so effective is that the microneedles deliver micro injuries to the surface of the skin while also allowing the RF energy to travel through the needles into the deeper layers of your dermis. The body’s natural response to these injuries is to produce more collagen and elastin. As the two building blocks of youthful skin, the end result is a smoother, plumper and more lifted looking face.

While microneedling/RF has been around for awhile, one of the newest innovations is to perform the procedure with ridged needles. This enables me to deliver topical serums such as:

• Hyaluronic Acid
• Vitamin C
• Vitamin A

The ridged needles allow these topicals to penetrate into your deeper dermis. One of the downsides of any topical skincare solution has been that it could only penetrate the skin’s surface. With the ridged needles, we now have the ability to produce truly dramatic facial rejuvenation without the need for incisions, downtime or anesthesia.

Benefits of Nanofat Injections

Fat grafting, a procedure in which excess fat is removed from one area of the body and placed in another, has quickly become a key player in most plastic surgeons’s arsenal. The reason is simple. It’s extremely effective for increasing volume in the buttocks, breasts and face. Nanofat injections take fat grafting down to the micro level. Instead of using fat to fill in folds, and volumize the cheeks and other facial structures, small droplets are injected throughout the face in order to thicken the skin. The end result is a plumper, more hydrated and youthful look. Even more exciting, the stem cells in the injected fat act like the fountain of youth, increasing blood flow and releasing growth factors to heal cells that have been damaged by age.

Thread Lift

Jowling or drapes of excess skin around the mouth and jawline is one of our patients biggest concerns. It is the result of a combination of factors including a loss of volume in the mid-face as well as the overall drop of collagen and elastin in the skin that begins in our 20’s. Jowling has also been notoriously difficult to treat without surgery. While a slight degree of droop may be improved with carefully placed filler, trying to use injectables to address jowling tends to result in an odd, overly puffed, “simian” look to the lower face.

A thread lift is a minimally invasive procedure that can improve jowling without downtime or anesthesia. The procedure has been around for years. However, it’s recently gotten its own facelift. The threads that we place today in our Silhouette Instalift, for example, are dissolvable versus the threads of old which were permanent. This delivers a far safer, superior result. The procedure is simple. I strategically place the threads, which have cones or barbs along their length, through tiny incisions on your face. These incisions are so small that they do not require stitches nor do they leave a scar. The cones catch the underside of the skin, lifting it up to a higher position. The body responds by sending collagen and elastin to the treatment area. The threads dissolve with time and you are left with a more lifted, youthful facial contour. The downside of a thread lift is that the results are not permanent.  However, for the right patient, this can be a fantastic way to improve the appearance of the lower face without having to endure the downtime required with a facelift.

To find out more about new non-surgical technologies such as Profound, Nanofat Injections, Non-surgical Rhinoplasty and the Silhouette Instalift at the Boston Center for Plastic Surgery, contact us today or call (617) 735- 8735 to schedule a consultation.