What causes skin to sag?
Sagging skin and wrinkles are two of our biggest patient concerns. Unfortunately, sagging skin can be seen long before we start feeling older, and it makes us look older than we feel. There are many factors that cause skin to sag:
- Lack of support – The collagen and elastin that provides your skin’s deep supporting structure and resilience begin to slow their replacement rates beginning in your late 20’s. This means the underlying collagen and elastin fibers that are the foundation of your surface skin appearance begin to loosen and unravel, creating less support and tightness. As more collagen and elastin is affected, we begin to see the outward effect – sagging.
- Loss of fat – Normally you think of losing fat as a good thing, but diminishing or “flattening” of fat cells, particularly in your face as you mature, further reduces the support of your surface skin. This leaves you with a loss of firmness, and a sunken or hollowed appearance of your cheeks and around your eyes.
- Bone shrinkage – Bone shrinkage is of particular concern in women, but it also occurs in men to a lesser extent. Bones thin and shrink as we mature, removing even more of the support for your skin.
- UV exposure – UVA/UVB exposure severely compromises collagen’s ability to rejuvenate its normal basket-weave matrix. Collagen literally gets “out of line.” These irregular bundles of collagen create an uneven support for skin.
- Environmental factors – Pollution, smoking, stress, lack of sleep, and harsh climate all contribute to reducing healthy skin rejuvenation.
Gravity – From the day you were born, gravity has been pulling at your skin 24/7. The significant changes start showing up when bad skin habits and natural aging processes intersect. The resulting loose skin is seen as jowling, droopy eyelids/brows, cheeks, smile lines (“parentheses”), and chin.
Sagging Skin Treatments
The options to treat sagging skin often tend to work complimentary for loose skin and wrinkles. We suggest you consider working on both problems at the same time to get the quality results we know you’ll want to personally experience. When dealing with sagging skin, the procedures and products that prove most effective and give the longest lasting results, are those that get your skin to act the way it did at an earlier stage of life. Rejuvenation mesotherapy is used to replenish the natural ingredients your skin needs to produce more collagen and elastin as well as a healthier skin surface. MicroLaserPeel®, fractional laser, Skin Tyte®, Ultherapy®, and even LaserLipo, although different procedures, all have the effect of using heat to stimulate your skin to respond by producing more collagen and rebuilding the structures supporting your skin whether it is your face, neck, arms, abdomen, or thighs. Dermal fillers, e.g. Juvederm® and Restylane®, can be used to fill in deep creases and wrinkles, and hollowed sunken areas around the eyes and in cheeks. The application of prescription-strength daily skin products can also provide additional collagen production that can’t be obtained from over the counter products.
If you have loose saggy skin where you’d like firmer tighter skin, call for a consult with Dr. Mudd to explore your options.
