Try keeping your head elevated for a week. Don't pull your facial skin, massage, scrub or exfoliate the skin for at least three weeks. You are also not supposed to wash or touch your face for at least 12 hours. Follow the care guidelines the practitioner gives you regarding the incision wounds.
Do not take a shower or wash your hair for the first 24 hours. Avoid hot showers for one week. When washing face after 24 hours, gently wash the required area with cleanser (recommended by your injector) and water. It is fine to shampoo and wash over the entry point and to towel off the area.
When the sutures begin to dissolve, it is likely you will notice the gradual return of sagging features. However, there is evidence to support that collagen is produced in the tissues surrounding the threads, which can lead to a longer lasting effect.
A study published by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) confirms PDO thread lifts do work, stating thread lifts indisputably lift and shape facial soft tissues. Another study published by the NIH indicates this therapy yields around a 90 percent success rate.
Your final results should appear within 1-2 months of treatment. During this time, your skin should have relaxed slightly as the threads settled into your skin.
How Often Should You Have Treatment? The results of this treatment can last for six to 12 months at a time, so how long the results of your treatment lasts will determine how often you should have treatment. Many patients opt to have regularly scheduled PDO thread lifts once or twice a year.
Thread lifts generally last between 12 and 18 months. However, this is dependant upon the individual patient and their age, lifestyle, skin type and how quickly their body breaks down the sutures. The procedure itself delivers immediate results.
Previously placed threads are not removed. We explain to patients that a threadlift is not meant to be a one-off procedure but must be repeated. The patients are given realistic expectations so they are not disappointed when sagging recurs.
Not only do the threads physically lift the skin, but they also stimulate the body's natural production of collagen, meaning thread lift results will continue to improve over time.
You should avoid smoking and drinking alcohol for at least 14 days after a PDO thread lift for the most effective results. Alcohol is a diuretic, meaning it causes you to lose a lot of water and essential nutrients necessary for proper healing. Drinking alcohol can also cause a dangerous increase in blood pressure.
PDO Thread Lift Complications do occur and dimpling, puckering and thread visibility are often the most troubling to patients and physicians. These complications can be applied to PDO, PCA and PLLA threads. Most providers choose PDO threads as they are dissolvable, therefore making this problem only temporary.
Longevity: Facelift Vs Thread Lift
The results of a facelift last far longer than those of a thread lift. In fact, a facelift can provide some level of improvement to skin quality for a full decade! A thread lift will probably need redoing after only 18 months at the most. In some cases, they can last less than a year.
PDO, or polydioxanone threads, dissolve after only six to nine months. Contrastingly, PLLA, or Poly L. Lactic Acid threads, dissolve after 12 to 18 months. PCL, or polycaprolactone threads, are the most durable of the three.
Thread breakage is a potential side effect. The threads may break due to excess facial movement, rubbing the skin, or exposure to moisture. When it does happen, breakage tends to be near the ends near the incision point. The broken thread poses no threat to you.
The ideal thread lift candidate is usually in his or her late thirties to early fifties, whereas most patients over the age of about 55 will benefit more profoundly from facelift surgery.
In the absence of complications, thread lifts look and feel relatively undetectable. In some cases, people have reported being able to feel the thread after it's inserted or noticed bumpiness at the surface of their skin, says Dr. Lee. Realistically though, some results can only be achieved with a surgical face-lift.
On average, patients require between 2 – 4 threads on each side of the face for a mid-face thread lift. An additional 2 – 4 threads may be needed for the lower face and/or neck.
The area that needs treating (jowls may need repositioning and require 6-8 cog threads per side). The number and shape of thread needed (1 PDO cog thread is longer and has had more costly engineering than 1 short smooth mono), so 4 cog threads will cost more than 10 smooth monos.
Results from a thread lift aren't meant to be permanent. Successful effects typically last from 1 to 3 years. Like other dissolvable dermal fillers, such as Botox, the threads used in the procedure will eventually be absorbed by the tissue underneath your skin. After a thread lift, you can resume your normal routine.
As long as you feel fine, and you are healing well following your thread lift treatment, you should be fine to have Botox done one week following your thread lift. If you still have concerns don't hesitate to ask your provider for their recommendation.
The thread lift is a minimally invasive alternative to a facelift. It combines a medical-grade threading material and the physical “pulling” or “lifting” of the skin to tighten the thread and reduce wrinkles. Targeted areas can include the jowls, jaw line, brow line, under eye area, forehead and cheeks.
Although rare, it is not uncommon for a painful lump to develop after a thread lift procedure. This may be caused by the thread buckling or curling under the skin.
A total of five cases of incomplete facial paralysis (2.6%) were reported immediately after thread lifting. In three of the cases, the unilateral eyebrows were weakened, and the temporal branch of the facial nerve was damaged.