Volume in the Lateral Cheekbone Area - Radiesse vs. Sculptra

Hello Dr Rivkin

My question probably relates to Miss J's, but I didn't want to hi-jack her thread!
I recently saw a surgeon, specialised in fillers of various kinds, who, when I said I wanted to replace volume on the cheek towards the back of my face (ie along the cheek arch, towards my ears rather than at the front of my face), muttered something about it not being good to put fillers there.
Unfortunately I was too phased by other things going on at the time to press him on this. Perhaps you can clarify? I wondered if it ran into problems with the filler needing to be of a structural density, but getting too close to the surface of the skin? Is it in these situations where the filler can appear blue or lumpy?
Incidentally, he thought sculptra would be unsuitable for me, though again I'm not sure why, is it difficult to control the amount of volume it produces?

Many thanks for your help.


hi annalies,
it sounds like your surgeon just doesn't feel like doing filler in that area.
it is, technically, a fairly difficult area to put in filler if you're not that experienced at filler injection. and most surgeons do surgery - they are not that experienced in fillers.
there's no reason why you can't put radiesse in the lateral cheek bone area - i do it all the time. you have to be careful that its symmetric, bump - free and it looks natural. sculptra is ok, but you don't have quite the control over the contour that radiesse gives you.