Allure magazine, 09/02 explores silicone injections

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Allure Investigates New Wave of Cosmetic Injections in Exclusive Report

9/02

NEW YORK, Aug. 21 /PRNewswire/ --

Inject at Your Own Risk

In 1992, the FDA banned liquid silicone for injections in the body, citing

its safety as "unproven." But a decade later, the most controversial of

wrinkle fillers is on the verge of a comeback, as a purified form of liquid

silicone is being considered for FDA approval. The medical community is

divided, with supporters of liquid silicone referring to it as "the gold

standard of wrinkle fillers," and detractors calling it "a time bomb." The

appeal of silicone is its permanence, and that is also part of the problem.

Silicone can migrate and clump causing chronic swelling and tissue growth --

which are often impossible to remedy.

In late 1991, a 33-year-old woman consulted a Park Avenue dermatologist

about a pockmark on the side of her nose. The doctor injected the blemish

with a drop of medical-grade, liquid silicone. Then he offered to fill her

laugh lines, explaining "You'll stay looking young for a long time." Two

years later, the injected side of her nose began growing and raised bumps

appeared in her laugh lines. A visit to a plastic surgeon confirmed she had

little recourse, so he built up the uninjected side of her nose for balance.

As the inflammation continued, a third doctor tried lasering out the bumps

causing the silicone injected to shrink, which looked even stranger. A fourth

doctor told her nothing could be done about the bumps along her laugh lines.

And this is just one case of silicone gone bad.

Since 1992, unlicensed practitioners have cropped up in abundance,

injecting women's faces and bodies with impure silicone and other unknown

substances at discount rates. Silicex, a French-made silicone oil,

confiscated in a Florida raid and obtained and analyzed by Allure, had such

low viscosity that "it could certainly move around the face after injection,"

explained New York dermatologist Rhoda S. Narins.

Another permanent wrinkle filler awaiting FDA approval is Artecoll, a

mixture of Plexiglas-like microspheres, collagen, and a painkiller, which can

be obtained in Canada or Europe. In March, Claudio De Lorenzi, a former

president of the Canadian Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery, stopped using

Artecoll in the lips after he and several colleagues found, he said,

"long-lasting bumps in patients' lips ..." Allure explores the dangers of

silicone injections and other wrinkle fillers in this piece.