Category Archives: Did You Know?

Botox Injections to the Scalp?

Don’t women want to work out in the gym and still have their alluring, blown-out hair style on? Or don’t women want to keep their salon-treated blow dry hair for longer at the office without worrying that they have to blow dry again and again? According to Us Weekly, there’s this beauty trend that will keep your style longer. What is just needed are Botox injections to the scalp.

It’s called ‘Blotox’, a procedure that requires about 200 Botox injections carefully placed under the hair follicles. It will prevent nerve endings from connecting to the eccrine glands, the glands responsible for sweat. Hence, if you will not sweat, you will not ruin your blow dry.

While Botox has been FDA-approved for treating crow’s feet, forehead and frown lines, dermatologists and beauty experts have been using it off-label for years in various application places. When performed by board certified specialists, these off-label applications can be safe and effective procedures. And as with all Botox treatments, the results wear off in about six months. Keeping your scalp free of sweat for some indeterminate amount of time, you’ve got to maintain the treatments.

This can be a busy body’s or a working woman’s dream come true. In spite of the grueling hours at the gym or an 8-hour office job and a date afterwards, people will have to worry less about sweat. With Botox-treated scalp, even kinky or curly hair that’s been blow-dried will remain straight longer.

Injecting the needle 200 times into your scalp may sound painful, or at least daunting, but the effort will only leave a tingling sensation in a 20 minute or so procedure.
Of course there are other less expensive and less daunting alternatives to Blotox – such as shampooing less frequently or using dry shampoos. But if you’re for Blotox, you are saving more time and effort, if not money, looking great all the time.

Benefits of Lip Fillers Over Surgical Implants

Lip Augmentation is one of the most popular cosmetic procedures today. It restores volume to thin lips and reduces the appearance of lipstick lines by filling age-related creasing along the lip border. It restores the lips’ texture and smoothness.

What is a good candidate for lip augmentation? Most women are good candidates for the procedure. If you want fuller, luscious lips because of thin lips, or if you wish to make your lip creases less noticeable because of age or because of smoking you can opt for augmentation. This can be done through surgical means or if you would rather skip the surgery, fillers like Juvederm are a good choice. Some desire a more permanent lip augmentation solution to create their ideal look.

Injectable dermal fillers are a more popular choice over surgery for a variety of reasons. They carry a number of benefits that most patients find attractive.

Firstly, most injectable treatments are simple procedures, taking just an hour to complete, but permanent lip implant surgery may require several hours. The surgery will require anesthesia as small incisions will be made on the lips. Fillers may require a small amount of anesthetic, too, though incisions are not called for.

There will be less bruising, swelling and fewer side effects with lip fillers. On the other hand, lip implants can cause mild discomfort, or swelling following the procedure. There is a need to return to your doctor to remove the stitches. Patients are usually advised to use ice packs during the first 24 hours after the procedure.

Because lip fillers are minimally invasive procedures, there is less downtime for patients. They recover easily and return to normal routine without problems. Lip implants through surgery can expect to recover in a week’s time.

Lip augmentation via fillers offer a temporary solution to patients who are not yet ready to commit to a permanent solution, as lip implants. They may wish to experiment first before deciding on surgery. If you had fillers, which effects can last several months, follow-up visits are necessary to maintain the results.

Bringing Back the Youth of Lips in Tacoma

Lip fillers are a safe way to enhance the volume, contour, definition and overall shape of your lips for a fresh, exciting look. Consult with us at Botixue in Tacoma and have the lips you’ve always wanted.

The Botox Benefits for Medical Conditions

Did you know that Botox has several approved indications that cosmetic clinics and some TV makeover shows don’t find necessary to talk about? After all, it’s already the No. 1 non-surgical beauty treatment in the country. Let’s look at some of these indications.

Botox is used to treat overactive bladder symptoms such as a strong need to urinate with leaking or wetting accidents (urge urinary incontinence), a strong need to urinate right away (urgency), and urinating often (frequency) in adults 18 years and older when other drugs, as anticholinergics, do not work well or cannot be taken. It is also indicated for incontinence in adults 18 years and older with overactive bladder due to neurologic disease or who cannot tolerate the side effects of anticholinergic medication.

Botox is used to prevent headaches in adults with chronic migraine who have 15 or more days each month with headache lasting 4 or more hours each day in people 18 years or older.

Botox is used to treat increased muscle stiffness in elbow, wrist, and finger muscles in people 18 years and older with upper limb spasticity. However, it is not known whether botox is safe or effective to treat increased stiffness in upper-limb muscles other than those in the elbow, wrist, and fingers, or to treat increased stiffness in lower limb muscles.

Botox is used to treat the abnormal head position and neck pain that happens with cervical dystonia (CD) in people 16 years and older.

Botox is indicated to treat certain types of eye muscle problems (strabismus) or abnormal spasm of the eyelids (blepharospasm) in people 12 years and older.

BOTOX is also injected into the skin to treat the symptoms of severe underarm sweating (severe primary axillary hyperhidrosis) when medicines used on the skin (topical) do not work well enough in people 18 years and older. However, it is not known whether it is safe or effective for severe sweating anywhere other than your armpits.

Not Just a Beauty Treatment

Know more about the wonders of Botox at Tacoma’s Botixue. While our expertise is in the cosmetic benefit of Botox treatments, you can always ask us, or ask your physician about it’s other indications.

The Botox Attraction

It’s that time of year when people go for a ‘beauty fix’ and plastic surgeons and beauty experts have their schedules full to the brim. There may be four times as many as procedures going on, starting from late October through the end of the year in many places. People are simply anticipating the holiday rush.

Students take time off for nose jobs, while the 40- and 50-something men and women are going ahead with facelifts, liposuction and tummy tucks; getting their beauty jobs done while out of office, on vacation, and way ahead of the summer wedding season.It’s also a time to enjoy their recovery period at home.

It also comes down to defying the aging process. That said, Botox treatments in many places are also at their peak during this time. It comes as no surprise, but still a staggering figure. The US Botox market is leading Canada as the top non-surgical procedure.

Botox treatments are getting better, safer and in more experienced hands than ever. BOTOX injections are a quick and cost-effective way to improve your facial looks and boost your confidence. The results are truly gratifying, softening the appearance of common lines and wrinkles, such as, crow’s feet (around the eyes), glabellar lines and forehead lines (both vertical and horizontal lines and creases), and smile lines (on each side of your mouth).

Following Botox injections, you will note increased improvements in your face over the following days as the treatment reaches its full effect. The procedure requires only local anesthesia. Effectively blocking signals relayed between certain nerves and muscles, Botox will cause a temporary paralysis in specific facial muscles. You’ll still be able to make normal facial expressions. One treatment will generally lasts 4-6 months before it needs replenishment. Over time, you may be needing injections less often as your muscles will seem more accustomed to relaxation.

Transforming Into A New You in Tacoma

Surprise your family and friends with a new ‘you’. What’s not to like about Botox? It’s safe, non-invasive, affordable. Come see us for a consult during this happy season.

Botox Timeline: From Spoiled Sausages to Sagging Eyelids

Botox didn’t just appear on the cosmetic scene and caused a sensation. It has a long and lively history.

German scientist, Dr. Justinus Kerner, in the 1820s, was trying to discover the biological basis for food poisoning after several deaths from spoiled sausages. His case studies led to a better understanding of the neurological symptoms of food-borne botulism, as drooping eyelids, difficulty swallowing, and muscle weakness. His suggestions for treatment and prevention of food poisoning paved the way for today’s therapeutic use of the toxin.

In the 1890s, Dr. Emile Pierre van Ermengem of Belgium, who was a student of Robert Koch (discoverer of the tuberculosis bacterium), investigated an outbreak of botulism and made a connection between botulism and a spore-forming bacterium later renamed Clostridium botulinum. Several strains of botulinum were identified.

When WWII broke out, the U.S. began researching biological weapons, including botulinum toxin (the nerve toxin produced by Clostridium botulinum), considered to be deadliest substance in the world.

In the 1950s and 1960s, researchers began focusing on the more beneficial aspects of this powerful toxin. Developments include purifying botulinum toxin type A into crystalline form, injecting small amounts into a hyperactive muscle blocked the release of acetylcholine from motor nerve endings, causing temporary relaxation, and experimenting with monkeys using the toxin’s muscle-relaxing effects to help in the treatment of crossed eyes (or strabismus). Since then, botulinum toxin type A became the toxin of choice in research labs around the world.

The ’70s and ’80s saw the birth of Botox. In 1978, ophthalmologist Dr. Alan B. Scott received FDA approval to use the toxin and published a 1981 paper asserting that botulinum is a safe and useful therapy for strabismus. More research showed the drug’s benefits went beyond ophthalmology, providing patients with temporary relief from facial spasms, neck and shoulder spasms, even vocal cord spasms.

In 1988, drugmaker Allergan acquired the rights to distribute Scott’s batch of botulinum toxin type A (or Oculinum). By 1989, the FDA approved the toxin for the treatment of both strabismus and blepharospasm (spasms of the eyelid muscle). Shortly, Allergan acquired Scott’s company and changed the drug’s name to the now famous and catchy “Botox.”

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