As we get older and wiser, our faces can start to reflect our years of experience and adventures. Years of smiling and laughing at first steps and proud accomplishments, concentrating on challenging tasks and frowning at frustrating situations make impressions in your memory—and your face. These experiences enrich your life, but they can leave you looking tired. You can reverse some of the visual evidence of aging, look younger, and feel better with BOTOX® Cosmetic.
What Causes Wrinkles?
Each time you use a facial muscle (to smile, frown, squint, or furrow your brows in concentration, for example), a groove forms beneath the surface of your skin.1 As skin ages, it loses its flexibility and is no longer able to spring back into place. As a result, the grooves start to become permanent features on your face. (It turns out that the old adage, “If you keep making that face it will stick that way” actually has some truth to it!)
Your skin also gets thinner and drier as it gets older and is less able to protect itself from environmental damage. One of the biggest damaging factors is exposure to ultraviolet (UV) rays, either from natural sunlight or artificial UV lights like tanning beds. UV light breaks down the skin’s supportive connective tissue of collagen and elastin fibers. This causes the skin to become weaker and less flexible; as a result, the skin can start to droop and sag. The more your skin is exposed to UV damage over your lifetime, especially if you’ve suffered sunburns, the more it will show as age spots, wrinkles, and drooping as you get older.2
Other lifestyle factors such as smoking and drinking can accelerate the development of wrinkles. Smoking tobacco reduces the blood supply to the skin, which deteriorates its health, and alcohol dehydrates the skin, making it more likely to wrinkle.
What Is BOTOX® Cosmetic?
BOTOX is a purified form of botulinum toxin A. In large amounts, botulism toxin A can cause botulism—usually recognized as a kind of food poisoning. Researchers began to discover in the 1980s that in small, purified, diluted amounts, botulism toxin can be useful. It works by blocking the nerves and chemicals that contract muscles, which causes temporary paralysis or weakening of muscles. Over the next decade, as researchers discovered numerous medical uses for the substance, they also noticed that it helped reduce frown lines in patients. BOTOX Cosmetic was approved by the FDA for use on facial wrinkles in 2002.3
How Can BOTOX® Help You?
BOTOX Cosmetic is approved by the FDA to temporarily improve the appearance of both moderate to severe frown lines between the brows and crow’s feet lines in adults.4 Its safety and efficacy have been evaluated in both manufacturer-sponsored clinical trials and hundreds of peer-reviewed articles in scientific and medical journals. According to its manufacturer, approximately 10.9 million vials of BOTOX Cosmetic have been sold in the United States since its approval in 2002.
BOTOX Cosmetic targets muscles that have contracted repeatedly over many years from frowning and squinting. When BOTOX is injected into the muscles, it temporarily reduces their activity, causing a visible smoothing and softening of crow’s feet lines, forehead creases, and frown lines between the brows.5 It may also help to smooth out deep lip and chin wrinkles. You may begin to notice results within 24 to 48 hours after treatment on moderate to severe frown lines; results can last up to 4 months.
BOTOX® Can Also Combat Severe Underarm Sweating
Did you know that BOTOX is FDA-approved to treat severe underarm sweating?6 It is an effective treatment in adults for this medical condition, known as “severe primary axillary hyperhidrosis,” when topical medicines, antiperspirants, and other treatments do not yield satisfactory results. After an administration of BOTOX, given in 10 to 15 small injections directly into the affected underarm area, patients should notice a significant reduction in underarm sweating within four weeks. Results can last up to 201 days (6.7 months) and generally return gradually; additional treatments can result in ongoing relief from symptoms.
Schedule a BOTOX® Consultation Today
BOTOX has many important medical uses and lots of promising potential, and it also is recognized as a quick, easy way to reduce the appearance of facial wrinkles and “turn back the clock.” If you’d like to look younger and healthier, schedule a BOTOX consultation at Urban Effects Medspa in Des Moines today.
1 “Wrinkles.” Mayo Clinic. Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research (MFMER), n.d. Web. 18 Jan 2018.
2 Nordqvist, Christian. “What Are Wrinkles?” Medical News Today, Healthline Media UK Ltd., 20 Jul 2016. Web. 18 Jan 2018.
3 Mapes, Diana. “Frozen in Time: BOTOX over the Years.” NBCNews.com, 22 Oct 2007. Web. 18 Jan 2018.
4 “Why BOTOX Cosmetic.” Botox.com, 2017, Allergan. Web. 18 Jan 2018.
5 “How Does BOTOX Cosmetic Work?” Botox.com, 2017, Allergan. Web. 18 Jan 2018.
6 "Medication Guide—BOTOX®, BOTOX® Cosmetic." FDA.gov. U.S. Food and Drug Admininstration, Jan 2016. Accessed 19 Jan 2018.
