Do your hands give away your age?

Frequently we focus on the face when discussing cosmetic improvement, but there are other telling locations that can be treated.   One of the areas that most give away our age is the hands. As we age, our hands lose firmness and plumpness and begin to look fragile and bony. The veins become more prominent, the skin starts to look thin, and often becomes speckled with brown spots from sun exposure.

Combating the aging hand takes more than hand cream, though that simple step does make a difference. But the cosmetic filler is often the answer.

This month the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the injectable dermal filler Radiesse (Merz North America, Inc) for hand augmentation to correct volume loss in the dorsum, or back, of the hands. This is great news!!   Radiesse is a fantastic way to turn back the clock and bring a youthful soft appearance to the back of the hands.

Radiesse injections immediately revitalize and replenish the volume of the back of the hands. And provide a supple and youthful appearance instantly. Placed beneath the skin, Radiesse raises the skin level so that tendons, joints, and veins lose their prominence.

Also, because Radiesse provides support and scaffolding for the deep skin tissue, the body’s own collagen is stimulated and begins to interweave with the filler and helps keep the skin feeling soft, natural, and smooth.

The results typically last 1 – 2 years with immediate improvement.

In the studies used to gain FDA approval the most common side effects were extremely mild and include injection site reactions such as swelling, redness, pain, and bruising, which were usually mild to moderate, short in duration (lasting about 1 week), and required no treatment. No severe adverse events were reported.