In the quest for youth – or at least a more youthful appearance – women and men are seeking treatments to minimize laugh lines, crow's feet and forehead furrows. A popular treatment involves injecting cosmetic wrinkle fillers into the face.
Injectable cosmetic wrinkle fillers are soft tissue fillers approved as medical devices by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). These devices are injected into the skin to help fill in facial wrinkles, restoring a smoother appearance. Most of these wrinkle fillers are temporary because they are eventually absorbed by the body.
Some people may need more than one injection to achieve the wrinkle-smoothing effect. The effect lasts for about six months or longer.
Successful results depend on:
- health of the skin
- skill of the doctor
- type of filler used
Human collagen, mass-produced from cultures of human cells, became available in 2002. Human collagen causes dramatically fewer allergic reactions, so skin testing is usually not needed. It is more expensive than bovine collagen, and injections also need to be repeated every three to six months.
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