Anti Wrinkle injections have a long track record for treating forehead lines. However, your forehead & eyelids will feel heavy for a few weeks afterwards. Your eyebrows and eyelids may also appear a little puffy first thing in the morning upon awakening but don't worry this will settle down.
Specifically, injections on the forehead or between the eyes may spread into the eyebrows and cause the brow to lower, causing a droopy eyelid. In most cases, droopy eyelid occurs between one and three weeks after treatment, and patients typically experience this adverse effect for just a few weeks.
Yes, Botox can cause droopy eyelids if it is injected in the wrong place or if too much is used. Because Botox is a muscle relaxing toxin, if it is injected into the muscles that hold the eyelids or eyebrows up, then this can cause the muscles that pull the eyelids down to be more emphasised.
The heavy sensation will completely go away once your Botox wears off in 3 months. But it usually becomes less noticeable after a week or two. If this has happened to you, be sure to let your doctor know this happened next time you get Botox, so he or she can adjust your treatment to prevent this problem in the future.
If your hooded eyelids are the result of an excessive amount of eyelid skin or because of a more pronounced brow droop, Botox is not a viable treatment. There are no neurotoxins that can reduce or tighten the skin.
You can also have a quick laser skin tightening treatment on your upper forehead. This will pull the eyebrows up and correct the heavy feeling. Sometimes you will need multiple laser skin tightening treatments and you can do them once a week.
When Botox is applied to problem areas around the eyebrows, the muscles relax and the skin on top of them becomes smoother. The muscles around the eyebrows are pulled upwards, elevating the eyebrows and making a patient's eyes appear more open.
Eye brow drop is one of the most common complications of Botox injections. We have few patients that come new to the clinic that ask us specifically to be careful with the eyebrow as they had them dropped before from previous injectors.
Using anti-wrinkle injections in the depressor of the brow (orbicularis muscle) can be a very effective way to avoid possible brow heaviness.
Botox Injection Mistakes: Where Not to Inject Botox
Injecting the frontalis muscles (the two main forehead muscles above the eyebrows) instead of the corrugator supercilii muscle (smaller muscles around the eyebrows) can cause a “Mephisto Effect” or “Spock brows” — comically arched eyebrows.
This is a fairly common error and results from over-Botoxing the forehead, specifically the frontalis muscle, which goes all the way across the forehead and is used to raise the eyebrows. Too much Botox can relax the forehead too much, which results in that heavy feeling.
Small but Strong… True eyelid ptosis is a very rare complication following Botox injection. This occurs as a result of migration of the toxin into the muscle that raises the eyelid (levator palpebrae superioris muscle – pink in the picture).
Many people worry that if they stop getting BOTOX injections, their wrinkles will come back faster and worse than before. However, this is not the case. If you stop BOTOX injections, your wrinkles will slowly start to come back, but slower than if you had never used BOTOX to begin with.
The Frontalis is the muscle in your forehead which controls the raising of your eyebrows. After 2 weeks, if you still feel heaviness, try gentle eyebrow raising exercises and blinking your eyelids rapidly for 30 seconds. Do this 4 times daily for 2-4 days as it may help resolve the heaviness.
The most common negative reaction to injections to your face is a droopy eyelid, also called ptosis or blepharoptosis. Most people don't have this problem. Around 5% of people who get Botox will have problems with eyelid droop. This number falls to less than 1% if a skilled doctor does the injection.
However, ptosis can also occur as a side effect of Botox treatment. About 2 percent of people who get a Botox injection may experience ptosis, especially when an untrained individual administers the injection. This probability declines to 1 percent when a skilled healthcare professional does the procedure.
Heavy brows and the feeling of drooping.
This feeling and look comes from treatment of the forehead muscles called the frontalis. These muscles move the brows up and in certain cases after Botox treatment, the relaxed muscle then makes the brows drop.
Excess skin of the eyelid, or prolapsed fat pads underneath the eyes, makes an individual more prone to this sensation. Chronic allergies and sinus infections may also exacerbate the heaviness, and sun exposure may cause eyelid swelling and thereby increase the probability that the drooping will interfere with vision.
In general, you should begin to see results between 24 and 72 hours, but some patients may not see full results for five days or more.
“When an area of the face is frozen with absolutely no wrinkles, you can assume the person has had a date with a needle.” "When you look at a photo and see an area of the face that is extremely smooth and shiny," Rusher says, "that can be an indicator that the person may have had Botox."
Eyelid ptosis is most commonly seen from inappropriate placement of botulinum toxin. This specific complication can be avoided by staying at least 2‐3 cm above the supraorbital margin or 1.5‐2 cm above the eyebrow while injecting into the frontalis.
It's highly recommended that you move your face around a lot after getting Botox. This includes smiling, frowning, and raising your eyebrows. It's similar to facial exercises, minus the touching. Facial movement may look — and feel — silly, but it actually helps the Botox work better.
Most of us are familiar with the benefits of BOTOX for smoothing forehead lines and wrinkles, but you may be surprised to learn that BOTOX can also help to lift drooping brows and correct hooded eyes in some patients.