Dr Moubayed is an otolaryngologist – head and neck surgeon practicing facial plastic surgery. He has been doing aesthetics for more than ten years. Through the clinic’s training academy, he teaches doctors, nurses and dentists, gives talks in Quebec and elsewhere, and exchanges ideas with colleagues. After years of teaching and watching others teach, one observation keeps coming back, and it has less to do with the product itself than with the way it is used.
A filler is a tool
Hyaluronic acid fillers are very popular. In the right hands and in the right patient, they can produce very nice results, for example in the lips, when the work is controlled and tasteful.
“The problem with fillers is that it’s just a tool.” It all depends on how you use it. You can make great art with a paintbrush, but you can also paint something that’s not very nice. Learn more on our dermal fillers page.
Lips and cheeks, then nothing else
Lips and cheeks are popular and easier to inject. That is often where beginner injectors start. The problem is that many never inject anything else, because of a lack of training, a lack of understanding of facial aesthetics, or simply because they have never actually seen that other areas of the face can be treated.
The face has to be approached in a balanced way, whether the goal is to enhance beauty or to rejuvenate. If you keep injecting the lips, the balance of the lower third of the face is lost: the chin starts to look too small, the lips too big, and there can be migration. If you keep injecting the cheeks, you end up with two big cheeks and a peanut-shaped head. See also our lip fillers page.
The areas that are often forgotten
At the clinic, the team does a lot of facial volume work, with dermal fillers and with fat grafting. These are the areas Dr Moubayed most often sees neglected:
- The temples. They hollow out with age, and very hollow temples are a telltale sign of aging. Treating them helps balance the cheeks. In the operating room, he sometimes grafts five or six millilitres of fat per side.
- The forehead. It can soften the profile, especially in women.
- The nose. Lifting the tip can look more youthful, and injection can soften or straighten the nose and improve its harmony.
- The pyriform region, at the base of the nose. Injected deep on the bone, a small amount replaces bone lost over time and can give a natural result.
- The pre-jowl sulcus, just in front of the jowl, where some bone is also lost.
- The whole chin, not just the middle. The entire region is the front of the mandible.
- The jawline. In very early aging, before a facelift is needed, gentle augmentation of the angle can help hide jowls that are starting to form.
- The earlobes, which can also be rejuvenated.
- Under the eyes and the upper orbit. A very small amount can be enough in the right patient, as long as it is injected in the right plane, directly on the bone, to avoid migration.
For some areas, fat grafting can be an option.
Hydrating the skin from within
There is also non-cross-linked hyaluronic acid, injected very superficially into the skin. It does not stay in place to add volume: it draws in water, sometimes up to 20 times its weight, and helps hydrate the skin. See our skinboosters page.
A team that trains every month
Every month, the team holds an “hour of excellence”: hands-on coaching and teaching with all of the clinic’s injectors. “It’s like our own little rounds,” Dr Moubayed explains. Everyone’s results are fine-tuned, feedback is given, and the team trains its aesthetic eye. That is the advantage of working with a specialized team that is passionate about the face.
Every treatment carries risks and requires a consultation to decide what suits your face. To talk it over with our team, book a free 30-minute discovery call. Clinique Face MD, the place for my face.