Hyaluronic Acid Filler for the Lips and Perioral Area

Abstract

Beautiful lips have always been desired for the harmonization of the features. They represent sensuality, happiness, sadness, competence to retain food, verbal communication, and youth, as they are affected by aging process. Lips are hold as a key aesthetic feature, and therefore considered as an issue of great importance in cosmetic dermatology. As long as people get older, the lips lose their fullness, their proportions and become wilted, pale, and thin. One of the most useful ways to improve their characteristics and to mold them is the augmentation and correction through the right use of the available soft tissue fillers. Since this field grows fast and new techniques are constantly developed, the aim of this chapter is to hold forth about how the specialist can get the best results. The hyaluronic acid (HA) fillers have been proved to be a good choice, since there are no rejection reactions, they are easily obtained, and their effects, as well as their complications, can be minimized with the hyaluronidase injection, making them a safe product even for beginners. More viscous HA aim to increase the volume of the lip, whereas the softer HA is injected through serial puncture technique to redefine the vermillion of the lip. The most common adverse effects are temporary bruising, itching, edema, erythema, induration, tenderness and pain at the injection site. The most serious adverse events are vascular occlusion with necrosis and embolization, mostly avoided by pulling back the plunger syringe before injection looking forward any blood reflux. Equally important to know how to deal with the fillers is to be well and readily prepared to treat their early and late complications.