Which is the best Non Surgical Facelift for me?

Which is the best non surgical facelift for me? With some many treatments available it’s easy to be confused, so I’m here to help you choose the right treatment. You may just be starting out on anti-ageing treatments and want something to ease you in with no downtime and little side effects. Or you may be looking for the most powerful treatment available as an alternative to surgery.   Here’s my guide to help you choose:

Your starting point… treatments with no downtime, little cost.

A good starting point as a preventative measure, or to give you a subtle lift.  I would definitely recommend electrical facials which are often referred to as a non surgical facelift.  Machines such as CACI, Icon Ultra, Dermalift all do similar things, by lifting and toning your muscles…. in other words going to the gym for your face.

The price for these treatments make them a great starting point.  They are very affordable, from £35-£80 per treatment and you can return straight to your daily routine.  There’ll be moderate redness (a little like having a regular facial) but you shouldn’t get any bruising or swelling or any sign of what you’ve had done!

In addition to this you can add in some Radiofrequency.  This treatment works at a different level to Electrical facials… they aren’t doing anything for the muscles, instead they promote tighter skin by making your ‘collagen producing cells’ work harder.  You may have heard of brands like Thermage and Tripollar or Collagen Wave. I often perform tailor made treatments which involve half an Electrical Facial and the other half Radiofrequency.

The price for Radiofrequency (sometimes referred to as RF) is usually a little more expensive. Expect around £50-£100 per session.

Both Electrical Facials and Radiofrequency treatments work and can give you subtle improvements, as well as slowing down the ageing process.  In both cases you need multiple treatments.  To make an initial improvement you’ll need 4-10 sessions in fairly quick succession. After that you just need to keep it there… a bit like going to the gym.  So you need to do it a lot at first, and then you can go less frequently to maintain the improvement.  It’s the same with your face.

A step up .. happy to have injections or not?

For more instant lift you could opt for a Liquid Facelift, using Dermal Fillers. Some people are totally against injections and others really don’t mind, so it really depends on where you stand. A liquid facelift restores lost volume in the cheeks, and can redefine the jawline.  You can also opt for Botox to soften frown lines in the forehead.

If you’re happy to go for injections, you can expect a little redness and possibly bruising.  You may also want to consider splitting the treatment into more than 1 visit, especially if you’re new to fillers.  The good thing is that it’s an instant lift, which is very gratifying.  If it’s done well it can look completely natural and no-one will even know that you’ve had fillers. The price very much depends on how much filler you need which will be discussed at a consultation.  The fillers will naturally dissolve over time and you can expect to want topping up around 12 months later.

Expect a price from around £650 upwards.

More advanced Non Surgical Facelifts..  more costly but no downtime.

If you don’t want filler but want something that’s going to pack a punch then a HIFU Facelift could be the choice for you.  It’s often called the best non surgical facelift in the world. The good news is that remarkably there is no downtime with this treatment.

You can book an appointment tomorrow morning, have the treatment and go straight to work! It’s suitable for the whole of your face, including your jawline and neck.  This is really good to know as the neck is one of those areas which is more difficult to treat.

The Price for HIFU is around £700-£1500 but it varies greatly depending on what part of the country you’re in.

Although no-one will know you’ve had HIFU, it can leave your face a little sore, like you’ve been chewing treacle for about 8 hours non stop. It’s not a lasting pain, more that you’ll know you’ve had it done. You can look a little pink in places, but only similar to a regular facial. In rare cases you can get a bruise.

A handpiece is placed on the skin and sends ultrasound waves into a very deep layer called the SMAS layer. This tightens and lifts your skin. Unlike fillers you don’t see the full result immediately.  It can take around 6-10 weeks for it to fully take effect.  It’s also difficult to predict exactly how much lift and visible difference you will see.

More expensive treatments with more downtime.

Next on the list are treatments like Plasma Pen and Thread Lifts.

Plasma Pen is one of the newest technologies which can be used on any areas of the face and neck.  The procedure causes little brown/black dots on the treatment areas, and they take around a week or just over to drop off.  You can also expect swelling on some areas like the eyelids, but not so much on the face and neck.  It’s a bit painful, but you can have numbing cream and a cooler to reduce the sensation.

The good thing about Plasma is that it’s very specific, so you can treat areas which you can’t always cover with other treatments, such as the eyelid, top lip and neck.  I wouldn’t recommend covering the whole face in one treatment, but rather to be very specific.  I am a very big fan of Plasma for the Eyelids and Neck area, as you can achieve fantastic results.  Imaging standing in front of a mirror and get hold of your neck at the back and pull it tighter.  That’s basically what you can do with Plasma.  Expect to have around 3 treatments spaced approximately 6 weeks apart.  Around 6 weeks after your last treatment you’ll see the full result.  The improvement will also last years.

Thread lifts are also good for very specific areas such as the Neck and Jawline.  This is also a bit painful, as it involves threading the skin with a needle, and pulling it up. The threads catch under the skin with little hooks, so it’s a bit like stitching the skin!  That said there are no actual stitches or surgical incisions, just entry/exit points where the needle has gone in and out.  This can obviously lead to bruising and swelling.  You can get an instant lift with thread lifts and the result can last 1-2 years.  As well as the immediate lift you will also get gradual production of collagen, making your skin tighter where the threads dissolve.

Prices for both vary greatly.  As a guideline – Plasma on eyelids or the Neck will be around £500-£1000 for 1-3 treatments.  Thread lifts cost from around £600 per area.  It really depends on how many threads you have, so the price goes up with the number of threads.

So hopefully you have a better idea of the best non surgical facelift for you, or what you can build up to.

There are of course a lot more anti-ageing treatments but the ones I’ve outlined here are the treatments which are considered to be non surgical facelifts.   You may also like to read the following articles:

• Can you look better than you did 10 years ago? Click here for that one.
• What is a non surgical facelift? Click here for that one

If you have any more questions feel free to contact me at rach@radiantliving.co.uk and I’ll be happy to help.