Luckily, non-surgical injectables like Botox and dermal fillers are also found to be effective in erasing the marionette lines off the face.
Marionette Lines
They appear as sagging skin due to the loss of collagen and elasticity from aging. Botox can help improve the appearance of these lines by injecting at least 2 to 5 units for each side.
The effects of the treatment will be visible after 3-10 days and they'll last between 2-4 months.
On the day of the procedure, your medical provider injects 3 to 6 units of Botox in each corner of your lower lip. The targeted muscle is called Depressor Anguli Oris, and it's responsible for pulling the corners of your mouth downward. The Botox temporarily paralyzes the muscle, lifting the corners of the mouth.
Botox is useful for relaxing the muscles that pull down the corners of the mouth, while dermal fillers are the “go-to” treatment for erasing marionette lines because they are more effective in adding volume to the lower parts of the face. Doctors may also recommend combining both treatments to achieve the best results.
Marionette lines usually appear around age 40, though some people begin to see signs of marionette wrinkles earlier. As frustrating as they may be, marionette lines are a completely normal part of aging.
There's a common misconception that Botox makes you look older when it wears off. On the contrary, regular Botox treatments make you look younger even after the neurotoxin wears off.
Botox reduces sagging jowls by tightening and lifting the jaw area. This pulls back the excess sagging skin that creates jowls in the first place.
When injected into muscles, Botox blocks the release of acetylcholine and inhibits muscle contraction. Limiting this movement not only relaxes facial wrinkles and lines, but it can also lift the corners of the mouth.
The needle should be inserted approximately 1 cm below the lip and a linear threading technique should be used to inject filler along the lower lip and into the marionette fold.
Bellafill patients have reported results lasting upwards of 7 years or even longer, whereas the results of other fillers vary from 6 months to 3 years. Bellafill is especially good for treating marionette lines, as well as other wrinkles and scars.
If your marionette lines are only just forming and are yet to really make their mark, microneedling is another great option. Also known as collagen induction therapy, microneedling works by creating tiny, controlled pinhole injuries in the skin.
Microneedling: This treatment makes tiny punctures in the skin around the marionette lines which will stimulate the production of collagen and soften the look of wrinkles.
Do not inject laterally down the nasal sidewalls. Injection points should remain in the orbicularis oculi for crow's feet injections; be careful not to massage lower injection point in case of diffusion into the zygomaticus. FIGURE 1. (a).
Drooping corners of the mouth: Gravity isn't the only thing pulling your smile down, there's a muscle doing that! Treatment with 4-8 units of Botox® can lift the corners of the mouth to reveal a lifted smile.
The Procedure
Small doses of Botox® are injected into the lower jaw and down the side of the neck along the lateral neck muscles. As with all Botox® injections, it may take up to two weeks to see the final results.
As for the cost, it depends how many areas are filled and how many threads are used. The cost is about $200-300 for a pair of laugh lines or marionette lines.
The injections themselves are not painful. We provide numbing cream, numbing injections and skin cooling to minimise any discomfort. Most of our dermal fillers also have anaesthetic mixed in with the filler in order to provide further pain relief.
And the depressor labii inferioris (DLI) muscle pulls down your lower lip, and you have one of these muscles on each side. When Botox spreads to any of these muscles, it will relax them. Usually this only happens on one side. This makes your smile on that side look different.
The "standard" dose, meaning what Allergan writes in the product information, is 40 units to the forehead and glabella (11's/frown) combined. If you have more muscle mass you may need more.