Needleless Lip Fillers A Game-Changing Treatment... Or A Dangerous Gimmick?

A new method of injecting fillers to plump up one’s pout has been making waves on social media of late: needle-free lip augmentation. This sans-needle treatment utilises a pen-like device to ‘shoot’ the filler into the lips with pressurised air: lip perfection without the injection, if you will. But is this procedure safe? What risk does it carry? And what is the final result? DR RIEKIE SMIT answers the questions on everyone’s lips.

While the concept of a needle-free lip procedure sounded very alluring to people at first, the initial hype and excitement that surrounded this innovation dissipated almost as soon as it began. This was largely due to the lack of similar results compared to that of the traditional syringe and needle method in lip augmentation.

#FullLips

Beautiful, voluptuous lips are very in-vogue right now, thanks to the Kylie Jenners and Angelina Jolies of the world. There are most certainly a number of patients out there who covet the perfect pout, but are holding back due to their fear of needles – or the price tag a lip augmentation carries.

In fact, it’s this very needle and pricing concern that boosted the trend in the international markets (especially the UK and USA) – but this unfortunately ended up having some disastrous consequences. So, in a way, it’s arguably better that South Africa is slightly behind global aesthetic trends, as we can learn from the mistakes of others.

What is this ‘emerging technology’ of needle-free lip fillers?

Lip fillers are traditionally performed by doctors with sterile injectable products that are inserted with either a needle or a cannula into the specific areas that need to be treated.

The needle-free devices, however, are in the form of a penlike mechanism that applies jet injection technology to force the filler with pressurised air through the surface into the more superficial layers of the lips. These tools actually resemble an ear-piercing device that shoots out with a quick click, which then ‘pushes’ the filler into the lips without the need for a needle.