If you’re not quite ready to commit to an invasive aesthetic procedure, a dermal filler like Radiesse at Plastic Surgery Specialists of South Florida in Hollywood, FL may be right for you. While you may be more familiar with hyaluronic acid-based dermal fillers, like Juvederm, we promise this calcium hydroxylapatite-based dermal filler won’t let you down, either. It’s perfect for certain situations.
Key Facts to Know About This Treatment
How Long Radiesse Lasts
Radiesse tends to last 12 to 18 months, but individual results vary. This calcium hydroxylapatite-based dermal filler lasts far longer than Juvederm, which typically lasts between six and nine months because it encourages your skin’s production of collagen. The durability of your specific results depends on several factors, including your overall health, the health of your collagen, and your lifestyle choices.
How Lifestyle Choices Affect Results
If you’d like to get the most out of your treatment, you need to address the factors that caused your volume loss in the first place. While volume loss in the cheeks can occur due to extreme weight loss caused by certain medications, illness, or diet and exercise, most of the volume loss that occurs is caused by volume loss. Caring for your collagen health is crucial because, by the time you reach age 25, your skin starts producing collagen at a significantly reduced rate.
Some of the most difficult lifestyle choices you must make to get the most out of your treatment are cutting out all tobacco products and minimizing your consumption of alcohol. One of the worst things you can do for the health of collagen is to consume any product containing nicotine, including chewing tobacco and smoking cessation tools. You should adhere to AHA recommendations for maximum alcohol consumption: one unit of alcohol daily for women or two units for men.
How Health Affects Results
Your health plays a significant role in the durability of your treatment because illness stresses your body. Unfortunately, when your body’s energy is being directed towards warding off or fighting infections, its energy cannot be used to produce enough collagen. Besides illness, other things that can stress your body and slow your collagen production include eating sugar and eating unhealthy fats, like trans fats and saturated fats.
There are several lifestyle choices you can make to protect your health, minimize stress on your body, and keep your collagen production rate as high as possible. To keep your immune system running as efficiently as possible, remain hydrated, get at least 2.5 hours a week of moderate exercise, and wash your hands regularly for at least 20 seconds at a time. You should also eat nutrient-dense foods and minimize your consumption of processed foods, like store-bought cereal, sports drinks, and protein bars.
Sessions Needed for Maintenance
Another thing you can do to extend the durability of your results is to schedule regular sessions. Your results may start to fade 18 months after your session. If you schedule a maintenance treatment for 15 months after your first session, you can maintain your ideal results for another 18 months. In other words, one maintenance session can ensure that you can enjoy 33 months of continuous flawless results, and your dose will be smaller for your maintenance session.
During your initial consultation, we will assess the health of your skin and the extent of your cosmetic concerns to determine when you should schedule your maintenance session. Alternatively, you can wait until your results start to fade to schedule a follow-up appointment. If you wait until your results fade completely, you will need the same dose that you required the first time to achieve your ideal results.
Sessions Needed for Initial Ideal Results
Another thing you need to know about this treatment is that you may only need one session to see your ideal results. How many sessions you will need depends, primarily, on the extent of your cosmetic concerns. If, for example, your cheeks are extremely hollow and look incredibly gaunt, you may need two or three sessions to add enough volume to be satisfied with your results.
Results You Can Expect From This Treatment
The results you can realistically expect from this treatment depend on what exactly you’re trying to treat. For example, if you are trying to restore volume to sunken, hollow cheeks, you can expect the volume in your cheeks to be restored. However, due to the inherent collagen induction of the treatment, you can also expect your cheek skin to become smoother, tighter, and more vibrant.
Similarly, if your goal is to smooth away moderate-to-severe wrinkles from around your nose, mouth, or eyes, you shouldn’t just expect smooth, wrinkle-free skin. You should also expect pigmentation to improve significantly. This is because collagen encourages cellular turnover. In other words, the dull, ruddy, or hyperpigmented skin cells are recycled and replaced with fresh, healthy skin cells with a normal skin tone.
Good Candidates
According to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, this powerful anti-aging treatment is safe and effective for nearly every fairly healthy adult. However, there are a few key things you must understand regarding potential candidacy for this injectable. First, regarding this treatment, an adult is considered an individual who is at least 21 years of age. While you may be a legal adult in Florida at 18, the FDA has determined individuals under 21 are too young.
There are, however, circumstances that preclude you from treatment. For example, you will be considered a poor candidate if you are currently pregnant or nursing or have breastfed recently. Furthermore, bleeding or blood disorders will preclude you from treatment as thin blood may result in bruising. Other medical conditions that can preclude you from treatment include those that require you to take blood-thinning medications, such as SSRIs, MAOIs, and NSAIDs.
Upper Limits Regarding Age
While you must be at least 21 years old to be considered a good candidate for treatment, there is not a hard upper limit regarding who is a good candidate for treatment. Most people receive treatment between the ages of 30 and 45. However, it is not uncommon to see clients who are 64 who are still considered a good candidate for treatment.
If you are 65 or older, you may need to undergo a more comprehensive health screening to ensure you do not have heart disease or any other medical condition that precludes you from treatment. Furthermore, you need to speak with your primary care physician to ensure you can stop taking any medication you may currently be taking that can thin your blood.
Feeling of Treatment
While this durable injectable is incredibly robust and the results are dramatic, the treatment is not painful at all. The needles we use to inject the filler is so fine that our clients do not find the need for an injectable or topical anesthetic. However, if you feel discomfort after having your blood drawn for medical tests, you may want to apply ice gently near the injection sites after your treatment.
While we all have different tolerances for injections, you should not expect to feel any pain. If you feel anxious about the slight pressure when the needle penetrates your skin, especially if you’re treating the thin, sensitive skin around your eyes, talk to your doctor about taking a mild sedative before treatment. Alternatively, we can apply a topical anesthetic, but your treatment will take longer due to the medication needing time to kick in.
Convenience of Treatment
Another thing you have to know about this treatment is its astonishing convenience. Immediately before your treatment starts, the injection sites will be sanitized with a powerful, yet gentle, alcohol-based antiseptic. This, combined with sterile, single-use needles, eliminates your risk of infection. After that, you only need to receive your injections. This takes mere minutes.
During your initial consultation, we will give you a better idea of how long you should expect your session to take. Usually, your appointment will take approximately 15 minutes. However, your session will last longer if you need a topical anesthetic applied before your session or if you are targeting several parts of your face, like your nasolabial folds and cheeks.
Preparation Required
There is so little preparation required for this treatment that some people do not have to prepare at all. Whether there are things you need to do or avoid in advance of this treatment depends on your lifestyle. Before this treatment, you need to stop taking any pharmaceuticals, including nutritional supplements and over-the-counter medications, that can thin the blood to mitigate your risk of bruising.
If you have poor circulation but do not have a diagnosed heart condition, you should take Garcinia Cambogia in the three days leading up to treatment to mitigate your risk of swelling. Furthermore, you should eat a light meal or healthy snack before your treatment and ensure you are hydrated. Some other things you may have to avoid consciously are alcohol and tobacco products for several days before your treatment.
Recovery After Treatment
One of the most common reasons that people shy away from invasive procedures is the extensive recovery process. After Radiesse, there is almost no recovery whatsoever. In fact, the recovery is so minimal that it can’t even really be compared to post-op recovery. After an invasive procedure, you have to go through a minimum of one week of intensive recovery and six weeks of fairly intensive recovery. Furthermore, it can be up to 14 months before you see the results.
The most restrictive part of “recovery” from this injectable is that you should avoid vigorous exercise, including high-intensity interval training and resistance training for the first 72 hours after your treatment. You should also avoid other activities that can elevate your blood pressure, such as consuming too much sodium, caffeine or spicy foods. You should also take care to protect against sunburn, remain hydrated, and eat nutritious foods.
Discover the Path to a Younger-Looking You Today
There’s no need to feel self-conscious about your appearance. If you find anti-aging creams to be completely ineffective for the smoothing of your wrinkles, you’re not alone, but you may not need to commit to an invasive procedure for long-lasting results. If you’re looking for safety, efficacy, and durability, Radiesse may be right for you.
This calcium hydroxylapatite-based dermal filler offers several benefits that simply are not offered by more common dermal fillers. To discover is this time-reversing treatment is right for you, please contact our experts now at Plastic Surgery Specialists of South Florida in Hollywood, FL to schedule a consultation. We can’t wait to help put you on the path towards a younger-looking version of yourself.
