Choosing Between Fillers or Fat Injections for Lip Augmentation

According to the American Association of Aesthetic Medicine and Surgery, many women want to have fuller, younger-looking lips. You can get either fat injections or dermal fillers to reach your aesthetic goals. If you are considering either fillers or fat injections for your lip augmentation, here’s what you should know.

Fuller Lips With Dermal Fillers

Hyaluronic acid is the main ingredient in dermal fillers. Having these lip injections can give you a temporary lip augmentation. Your doctor can use dermal fillers to provide four to 12 months of natural, younger-looking results. Your lips can smoothen, increase in volume, and enhance in shape after 15 to 30 minutes of treatment. The number of sessions depends on your goals. Your doctor can adjust how much filler to administer to achieve the results you want.

There will be little or even no downtime at all. You can walk out of the clinic with evident results. The effects will stabilize in two weeks. The side effects are mild. Redness, bruising, and swelling often go away a short while after the session. Severe complications are rare, especially since the dermal fillers will be in the hands of a licensed provider.

Dermal fillers have temporary effects. You should have touch-up treatments by schedule to maintain the fullness of your lips. A skilled and experienced provider can give natural-looking results. Checking for possible allergies must happen before the first session. Some patients may have a bad reaction to the filler’s ingredients.

Younger-Looking Lips With Fat Injections

You may also talk to your provider about fat injections. This treatment involves the use of your own fat. Your doctor will re-inject it into your lips. This will make your lip contours plumper and smoother.

Using fat injections is a more detailed procedure. You will need to clear up where the donor area is in your body. Common ones are the flanks and abdomen. The doctor will perform liposuction to extract the excess fat. The provider will disinfect and liquify the fat. This will then make the fat ready to inject into your lips.

The fat graft will enter your lips. It will develop its own blood supply with your lips to sustain itself. About half of the injected fat in your lips will remain. This fat will last for the rest of your life. Even so, the general results will be less predictable. If you want this treatment, you will need many fat injections to achieve plump lips.

You will have a natural look and feel on your lips after the fat injections. There will be no need for incisions at all. This treatment will make you less vulnerable to allergic reactions or infections. You will not need more treatments once you achieve the results you want.

Aging can make your lips dry and wrinkled. Dermal fillers and fat injections can improve the appearance of your lips. You and your doctor can discuss which method will suit you the most.


Feel free to call Kenneth Bermudez, MD, at 415-712-1800 to reach our clinic in San Francisco, California, to schedule a consultation or inquire about our lip augmentation packages.