It’s nothing unusual for famous people to worry about sagging skin on their hands. However, in recent years there has been an explosion in the availability of anti-wrinkle products and procedures for the hands. The reason for this is because the aging baby boomer and generation X consumer base has higher expectations of the cosmetics sector. Rather than accepting the inevitable, individuals are seeking for non-invasive methods of looking and feeling younger.
One such procedure is Botox for the hands. Although Botox has been used for over 20 years to diminish the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles in the skin of the face, some people still refuse to accept having injections performed. Botox injections into the hands may be an option for these folks. Doctors can ensure their patients’ satisfaction with the injection site by letting them choose it themselves.
Botox For Hands is an L.A.-based company providing Botox treatments for overworked and under-appreciated hands that are afflicted with painful, wrinkled finger joints. For more information about how this anti-aging treatment can help you achieve smooth, wrinkle-free palms by contacting Botox For Hands. Read on to learn more. on botox for hand sweating cost and botox in hands for raynauds.
Botox For Hands
Botox is a neurotoxin made from the microbes that cause botulism (a kind of food poisoning). But don’t worry, it’s safe if used appropriately by a medical professional.
Botox is most well known as a cosmetic treatment to smooth facial wrinkles by temporarily paralyzing muscles. Doctors also use Botox to treat neuromuscular conditions like migraine, muscle spasms, and hyperhidrosis, a condition characterized by abnormal and excessive sweating.
You may be a candidate for Botox if your sweating fails to improve with prescription antiperspirants. Botox has been FDA-approved for people who sweat excessively from their armpits. It may also be used “off-label” to reduce sweating in other areas, such as the hands, feet, and face.
Note
Off-label refers to using a medication for something other than what it was approved to treat. In this case, it means that Botox hasn’t gone through the same amount of rigorous testing to confirm its effectiveness and safety for treating excessive sweating in other areas of the body.
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Botox For Hand Sweating Cost
Botox for sweating pros
- less invasive than surgical treatment
- minimal pain when injected in the armpits
- generally safe
- can be an effective treatment, with one study finding a 90 percentTrusted Source decrease in sweat production 2 weeks after the procedure
Botox for sweating cons
- expensive, with Botox for both underarms costing about $1,000
- considered painful if injected in the palms or soles of the feet
- follow up injections are needed roughly every 7 to 16 months
- only FDA-approved to treat armpits
- pain and other side effects are possible, but generally mild
How do Botox injections work to treat sweating?
Botox injections block the release of the neurotransmitter acetylcholine, which binds with your sweat glands to signal the release of sweat.
Normally, your nervous system activates your sweat glands when your body temperature rises. This is how your body automatically cools itself. In people with hyperhidrosis, however, the nerves that signal the sweat glands are overactive.
When you receive Botox injections directly into the area of your body that commonly sweats, your overactive nerves are essentially paralyzed. When your nerves can’t signal your sweat glands, you don’t sweat. However, Botox only prevents sweating in the specific area where it’s injected.
Where is Botox used on the body to treat sweating?
Currently, Botox has only been approved for the treatment of underarm sweating. StudiesTrusted Source have found varying results, but there’s ample evidence that Botox can reduce armpit sweat production by more than 50 percent for at least 6 months.
Doctors use it “off-label” to treat other areas of the body.
- Palms. A limited amount of research has investigated the effectiveness of Botox for palm sweating. StudiesTrusted Source have found that Botox may reduce sweating by roughly 25 to 50 percent for 3 weeks to 6 months.
- Face. A very limited amount of researchTrusted Source has found that Botox may help treat facial sweating. Studies have found Botox could reduce facial sweating for 5 to 6 months with the most common side effect being paralysis of muscles in the forehead.
- Soles of feet. Botox may help control sweating on the soles of the feet, however few studies have been done. In a small 2018 studyTrusted Source, 73 percent of a group of people ages 12 to 17 were satisfied with their results.
How do I prepare for the procedure?
Botox injections are a simple and quick procedure done right in your doctor’s office. Doctors typically ask that you wear a short-sleeved shirt and avoid shaving your armpits for 2 or 3 days prior to your appointment. If you take blood thinners, your doctor may ask you to stop for a few days before your injections to prevent bruising. Tell your doctor about any medications you’re taking and don’t stop taking any medications unless your doctor tells you to.
Your doctor may also recommend wearing a dark-colored shirt to avoid getting ink on it.
What is it like to get Botox injections?
Your appointment will likely last about 45 minutes but the injections will only take 20 to 30 minutes.
Botox injections work best when given by an experienced practitioner. Injections don’t take long and can be completed during an office visit. A professional will mark your skin with ink and inject the Botox medication just below the surface of the skin using a fine needle. You’ll receive 15 to 20 injections that form a grid pattern around your area of concern. Some clinics may give you slightly more.
The practitioner may give you something to prevent pain, like ice or a numbing agent.
You can return to work and normal life as soon as you’re done with your Botox injections. The practitioner will likely ask you to schedule a follow-up appointment to check in and touch up any missed spots.
When do the effects of Botox kick in for sweating?
You can resume your normal activities immediately after receiving Botox injections. It usually takes between 2 and 4 days to notice your results and 2 weeks for the injections to take full effect.
The effects of Botox are temporary, which means you’ll need more injections in the future. For underarm sweating, booster injections are generally needed every 7 to 16 months. Results may not last as long for the hands and feet, and you may need to repeat your treatment after about 6 months. However, there’s still limited research examining the effectiveness of Botox for these body parts.
What to expect after treatment
You should be able to go home immediately after your procedure. Generally, little aftercare is needed. You may feel tender around the treated area for the next day or so.
Your doctor will likely want you to follow up about 2 weeks after your appointment once the Botox takes full effect. You may need an additional procedure to treat any missed spots.
Doctors often recommend avoiding deodorant or products with perfume under your arms for about 12 to 24 hours to avoid irritation. Avoiding intense exercise and hot baths for 1 to 2 days may also help.
How expensive is Botox for sweating?
The cost of Botox injections varies greatly depending on your circumstances, the clinic you visit, and where you live. If you need several areas of your body done, the costs can be substantial. The typical cost for both underarms is roughly $1,000. Some insurance companies cover all or part of the cost for people with hyperhidrosis. In most cases, your insurance company wants to see that you have tried other options first, such as prescription antiperspirants.
What are the risks and side effects of Botox for sweating?
Many studiesTrusted Source have been done evaluating the safety of Botox for underarm sweating. Most people tolerate it well. Fewer studies have examined the safety of Botox when injected in other body parts to stop sweating.
Possible side effects include:
- pain or bruising at the injection site
- skin irritation
- bleeding
- headache
- flu symptoms
- droopy eyelid (for facial injections)
- eye dryness or tearing (for facial injections)
- facial paralysis (for facial injections)
Serious side effects of Botox injections are extremely rare. Serious side effects happen when the Botox affects your entire body. This can happen hours, days, or weeks after your injections. Rare but serious side effects include:
- muscle weakness in the entire body
- trouble seeing
- difficulty breathing
- loss of bladder control.
Botox In Hands For Raynauds
Botox is actually a brand name of a toxin produced by the bacterium Clostridium botulinum. When injected into the hands or feet of patients with Raynaud’s disease, it acts to decrease the shrinkage of blood vessels which may help heal skin ulcers and lessen the painful symptoms associated with this disorder.
When temperatures drop, we do everything we can to stay warm— turn the heat up, grab our heaviest blankets, and remember to dress in layers, layers, layers! But for people who have Raynaud’s syndrome, keeping hands and feet warm in the winter is an even greater challenge.
UVA Health is one of the first hospitals in the country to offer a revolutionary treatment technique for severe Raynaud’s syndrome. Image-guided botox injections performed by radiologists can help fight against the symptoms of Raynaud’s disease for up to 6 months. Continue reading to learn more about Raynaud’s syndrome, and how this safe, effective procedure helps blood circulate properly, keeping fingers and toes warm.
What is Raynaud’s Syndrome?
Raynaud’s syndrome, also called Raynaud’s disease, is a disorder that affects the circulation in the extremities of the body. People with Raynaud’s have blood vessels (usually in the fingers or toes) that overreact to cold temperatures or emotional stress. Of course, it’s normal to experience some cold or red fingers and toes in low temperatures, but Raynaud’s is a more serious condition. This disease is more common among people living in colder climates, and usually affects women more than men.
When your body is cold, it tries to conserve heat by slowing down blood flow to the farthest points in your body. The network of smaller arteries that function to carry blood to these extremities get narrower to keep the body’s blood closer to the core and to protect all of your most important organs. When arteries and blood vessels shrink and temporarily limit blood flow, this is called a vasospasm. Doctors have observed that in people who suffer with Raynaud’s disease, the arteries shrink more and faster than normal, but they still are not exactly sure why.
What are the symptoms of Raynaud’s?
A Raynaud’s attack usually happens when someone is outside in low temperatures, touches something cold, or is under some kind of stress. During an attack, the skin on the fingers or toes may first turn completely white. You can often see a distinct line of color change between the white skin of the fingertips or toes, and the pinkish skin of the rest of the hand or foot where blood is circulating normally. Next, the fingers may turn blue and feel extremely cold or numb.
If the person changes their environment or begins to warm their fingers or toes, the affected areas of the body may swell, turn red, tingle, throb, or sting. This can be a painful process for Raynaud’s sufferers.
Some people who suffer with mild Raynaud’s syndrome may be able to decrease their symptoms by making adjustments to their lifestyle habits. This may include limiting exposure to cold as much as possible, always wearing warm socks and gloves, purchasing electric or chemical hand warmers, avoiding using tools that vibrate, quitting smoking, or taking blood pressure medications in the winter that help improve circulation. However, some people may have more severe cases of Raynaud’s disease that require looking at further treatment with a doctor.
Severe symptoms of Raynaud’s disease include:
- Frequent Raynaud’s attacks
- Digits that are continually purple
- Skin ulcers that form on the affected fingers and toes
- Constant throbbing and pain
- Dying tissue
How Image-Guided Botox Treats Raynaud’s Disease
For some time now, Botox injections have been performed as a treatment for severe Raynaud’s syndrome. But at UVA Health, specially trained musculoskeletal radiologists now use ultrasound-guidance as a new technique for these injections, making the procedure more precise while attempting to reduce the chances of complications.
Botox is actually a brand name of a toxin produced by the bacterium Clostridium botulinum. When injected into the hands or feet of patients with Raynaud’s disease, it acts to decrease the shrinkage of blood vessels which may help heal skin ulcers and lessen the painful symptoms associated with this disorder.
When the procedure is performed using the traditional approach (or without image guidance), there have been reported cases where Botox is injected or spreads into the nearby muscles in the hand, which can cause hand weakness for up to 6 weeks. At UVA Radiology and Medical Imaging, we use radiation-free ultrasound guidance to directly visualize the tissues of the hand and precisely inject a concentrated dose of Botox next to the affected arteries and away from the muscles.
Local anesthetic (Lidocaine) is first injected next to nerves in the forearm to minimize any pain associated with Botox injections. In total, the procedure takes only about 1 hour to treat both hands or both feet. Patients have found improvement in symptoms of Raynaud’s syndrome for up to 6 months after their Botox injections. This safe, relatively simple procedure is revolutionizing treatment for Raynaud’s disease.
Botox is often an effective treatment for excessive sweating. For some people, it drastically improves their quality of life. The injections can be costly and aren’t always covered by insurance, but they may be a good option if you don’t respond to other treatments like prescription antiperspirants. You can speak with your doctor or insurance company about getting your Botox injections covered.