With the holidays coming up and your various parties, dinners at friends’ homes, and family get-togethers, now is a good time to enlist a little help from Botox. Dr. Saltz uses his extensive knowledge of facial anatomy to ensure your results are exactly as you’d hope.
What is Botox?
If you haven’t heard of Botox by now, you’ve probably been living in the wilds of Borneo or in an abandoned mine outside of Elko. Botox is one of the world’s most famous brand names. That’s funny because it is primarily made of the same bacteria that cause botulism, the botulinum toxin type A. That sounds scary, but it’s not. After all, you can find the same bacteria in forest soil and throughout the natural world. Plus, way back in the lat 40s, scientists found that when injected in minute amounts into a muscle, the botulinum toxin temporarily stopped that muscle from contracting. As you would imagine, this presented opportunities to treat conditions where involuntary muscle contractions are the problem, such as eyelid spasms. That use was actually the first FDA approval of Botox, for blepharospasms, in 1996.
But in 2002 Botox became a rock star. That was the year the FDA approved it for treatment of wrinkles on the upper third of the face. Every year since then Botox has been the most popular aesthetic treatment all around the world.
How it works its magic
When Botox is injected into a muscle it blocks the acetylcholine, the nerve messenger, from getting messages from the muscles up to the brain. The brain never receives the messages to contract the various muscles, so it leaves the muscles relaxed. On the upper third of the face, wrinkles form above muscles used to make various expressions, such as frowning, squinting, or showing surprise. As our skin loses its elasticity and thins, coupled with making these expressions hundreds of thousands of times, wrinkles begin to form on the surface above the muscle. These are crow’s feet outside the eyes, the 11s between the brows, and various forehead lines. When Dr. Saltz inject Botox into the muscles responsible for these wrinkles, the botulinum toxin blocks the nerve messages and the muscles stay at rest. Voila, the wrinkles no longer form on the skin above!
And who wants things like crow’s feet to accompany you to your holiday funfests? Exactly no one. So, give us a call at our brand new Park City office, (435) 655-6612, or our Salt Lake City office, (801) 274-9500, and schedule a Botox session now to get ready for those parties. It takes about four days for Botox to fully relax the muscles, so plan accordingly.
