MARIONETTE LINES
MARIONETTE LINES
Marionette lines are often talked about but confused facial features. They tend to develop as we age but their appearance depends heavily on everyone’s individual anatomy.
If you don’t know what they are, marionette lines are long lines along the sides of the chin, running from top to bottom. They form for two reasons: the first collagen in the cheeks weakens as we age, allowing the cheek to become sallow and sag down the face as fatty tissues become thinner. The ligaments around the mouth and chin also begin to loosen and relax, allowing more movement of skin and underlying structures.
It is hard to naturally minimise the appearance of marionette lines due to the constant effect of gravity. This produces a down and inward movement on your face increasing both nasolabial and marionette lines. Remember that smoking will also weaken the collagen in your face and exacerbate any negative effects.
Finally, most men and women want to get rid of these lines for one simple reason: overly pronounced marionette lines get exaggerated by a muscle called the depressor anguli oris or DAO. As you may have guessed from the name, this muscle pulls down on the outside angles of the mouth, causing a sad or unhappy expression.
How can my Marionette lines be treated?
Due to the multiple causes of these facial lines, careful examination, and assessment by an experienced practitioner is a must. Simply relying on one treatment is unlikely to give the best results. While you may want to lessen or get rid of your marionette lines, treating them directly is the wrong approach most of the time, especially with more mature patients.
Some patients will benefit from dermal filler in their cheeks to start with, whilst for others, the use of a thread lift is a great idea which gives amazing results when sagging of the skin is quite pronounced.
When attempting to treat marionette lines, using dermal filler repeatedly and injecting too much into the cheek area when initial results are not satisfactory is a short-sighted approach. It inflates the cheeks too much, especially on mature patients, and gives an unnatural result when your face is static and in motion.
Again, care must be used when over utilising the same procedure over and over again. Too much filler can create an unnatural look, shifting the overall dynamic and contours of the face.
This is why marionette lines are best treated with someone who has plenty of experience in restoring youth and beauty and can create a bespoke treatment for each patient according to the level of impact of the ageing process on the face and the patient’s individual desires. While lines on the face can feel unsightly, the overall shape and tone of the face are much more important.
MARIONNETTE LINE PREVENTION
MARIONNETTE LINE PREVENTION
Marionette Line prevention
Whilst you cannot escape genetics or gravity, don’t forget that with complex skin concerns it is always best to ensure the best for your skin, both before and after any treatment.
Remember things like smoking, dehydration and too much time tanning in the sun can all weaken and damage the skin. Smoking especially is known to activate hormones in the body that actively break down the supportive collagen structure in your skin. Stopping or reducing these activities in the first place is a necessary step in the prevention of further lines and sagging.
Introducing the Thread Lift
A thread lift is now considered vital to restoring more significant marionette lines to a more natural and youthful appearance. Cosmetic surgery has come a long way in recent years and thread lifts are a great example of this. Gone are the days of invasive, complicated and risky surgery. Thread lifts are a necessary step for those with more noticeable skin thinning and drooping.
A thread lift procedure does indeed use thread. Medical grade pulling threads are placed just under the surface of the skin, gently lifting the skin upwards into a higher, original position. In this way your face moves back through time. In contrast, using dermal fillers alone on more pronounced indentation does not move skin back as effectively to a more youthful position.
Thread lifts only require local anaesthesia rather than general anaesthetic, meaning you can return home promptly after the procedure with only a couple of days off work. Due to its minimally invasive nature, bruising and swelling is thankfully kept to a minimum, with the threads themselves dissolving away within 12 months’ time.
Take a look at our Ultra V lift using PDO threads that not only resorb within 3 months but also promote collagen growth and structure.
USING DERMAL FILLER PROPERLY
USING DERMAL FILLER PROPERLY
We have talked about the dangers of overuse, but dermal fillers definitely have their place in the treatment of marionette lines. When injected just under the corners of the mouth they lift your smile and remove signs of unhappy expression whilst smoothing out smaller wrinkles.
For those with moderate marionette lines, we recommend the cheeks are filled and lifted first. This can then be followed up with chin filler injections to balance the overall facial aesthetic. Then the corners of the mouth are refined with a final round of injections.
For those patients who have more significant lining or drooping of the skin an extra step is required for optimal and long lasting results.
After injections of the cheeks and chin, a thread lift, as described above brings a stronger and more refined appearance to the face.
The fillers are applied in a careful and artistic manner, using your own anatomy to guide our application. Thicker, more viscous filler is guided around the bony structure of your face, while thinner, light filler is used in more superficial areas.
Dermal fillers contain hyaluronic acid which helps restore lost volume to the face. Using almost painless injections, collagen production can be stimulated whilst also drawing moisture to the area.
This increase in structure and hydration fills in wrinkles and folds, giving a more naturally filled out appearance with improved skin texture and firmness.