Lip service from PE experts
AMERICAN reality television star Kylie Jenner may only be 17 but has already sought professional help to make her naturally plump lips even fuller – a procedure that Port Elizabeth cosmetic and medical professionals say is in “huge demand”.
In an episode of Keeping Up with the Kardashians, the teen is seen looking flustered after a reporter confronts her about her lips at her hair extensions launch.
Kylie claimed she used “six different” lip products to achieve her noticeably fuller pout and insisted she never lied about seeking professional help but conceded she “might have tiptoed around the truth”.
The teen finally revealed she had used temporary lip fillers.
“I have temporary lip fillers, it’s just an insecurity of mine and it’s what I wanted to do.”
Even though the teen and her mother, Kris Jenner, have been publicly criticised due to the fact that she is only 17, some of Kylie’s fans have complimented her on her lips.
For those women in Port Elizabeth looking to plump their lips, dermatologist Dr Derek Odendaal, general practitioner and aesthetic treatment specialist Dr Mike Henry and permanent cosmetic artist Gina Daniels shed some light on the topic:
ý Dermatologist Odendaal said the growing trend in cosmetic surgery had resulted in some “fantastic products” over the past few years.
“There is a huge demand for lips in younger people and more natural fullness later on, as well as the popular mouth lift to reduce sagginess and drooping mouth corners,” he said.
However, even though Kylie may be a favourite comparison right now, not every woman could pull off her set of lips, Odendaal said.
“There are factors that determine how full a lip can be, such as age, natural size of the mouth, and the shape of teeth and mandible.
“I prefer to perfect what the person has, rather than to strive for duplicating a celebrity’s lip, which often is the reason for disappointment if expectations aren’t met,” Odendaal said.
ý Henry, at the Taryn Laine Clinic, said lip enhancement could be extremely uncomfortable but this could be alleviated by various local anaesthetic techniques.
“The treating aesthetic doctor needs to be well-trained, experienced, and gifted to do it both safely and artistically because those lacking artistic skills will create a uniformly inflated tyre duck-lip, a wide-mouth frog appearance or left to right asymmetry that is aesthetically unattractive,” Henry said.
He said lip fillers were skillfully placed into the lips in a way that shows up more of the vermilion (red part), by creating an attractive and tasteful inflation.
According to Henry, injectable fillers are naturally occurring substances that everyone has in their skin, and so are very safe to use, with minimal risk.
“They have become softer and pliable and don’t cause small lumps like they did a few years ago,” he said.
Lip filler treatments can usually be completed in 15-45 minutes, depending on the complexity of the process.
He emphasised that the entire procedure was reversible “if for whatever reason the person doesn’t like the new look. It can literally be melted away with reversal injections”.
ý Daniels, who works at Beautiful You in Walmer, said the salon offered permanent make-up, where pigment is tattooed in the lip area to give colour, volume and to also extend the lip.
“The most frequently requested permanent cosmetic procedures are the eyebrows, eyeliner and lip colour. Your permanent make-up is designed to suit your individual look and can be worn alone or with additional makeup,” Daniels said.