Cosmetic Plastic Surgery Articles

With warmer weather on the horizon, many of us are weighing the same concern: Where exactly do you draw the line between normal and excessive sweating? And, is it safe to get sweat-halting Botox injections before a big occasion, like your wedding? As it turns out, excessive sweating, or hyperhidrosis, is more common than you think.

Unpacking hyperhidrosis

There are two types of hyperhidrosis: primary and secondary. Primary is the more common of the two. It’s a result of overactive signaling from the sweat glands to secrete sweat. In other words, your body starts sweating without any clear reason. Primary hyperhidrosis can occur at any time and during any point in the year. You don’t necessarily need to feel warm. You can even be asleep when it happens.

Most commonly, it’s seen in the underarms, palms, and soles of the feet, though it can happen pretty much anywhere on the body, including the face.

Secondary hyperhidrosis, by contrast, is excessive sweating that’s brought on by an external factor, like medication or a physical condition, such as diabetes or a thyroid issue. With both types, there are also different degrees of hyperhidrosis: mild, moderate, and severe. Sweating through your shirt without doing much of anything on a temperate day would usually be classified as moderate hyperhidrosis. Severe is something along the lines of pouring sweat from your hands and feet when you’re at rest without any triggers.

When to be concerned

Now that we have a clear idea of how excessive sweating is defined, let’s get back to our original question: When is it time to start worrying about your sweat levels?

There’s an aspect of hyperhidrosis I neglected to mention before: It’s a relative disorder. Basically, how you perceive your sweating is very personal. What might be excessive to you is normal to somebody else. So, hyperhidrosis is harder to define than it first appears.

Generally, though, if it’s something you’re thinking about and it’s caused you some level of embarrassment, it’s worth mentioning it to your doctor. There’s no such thing as an overreaction here.

Does Botox really help?

Botox—yes, the same injectable that could help fend off wrinkles between your brow—is the longest-lasting nonsurgical treatment for hyperhidrosis. It’s most effective in the underarm area, where it can work for up to 14 months.

Botox works by paralyzing the nerves responsible for activating your sweat glands, but only in the specific area where it’s injected. You’ll receive several injections with a fine needle that’ll form a sort of grid pattern around the area of concern. It’s a relatively simple procedure that can be done during an office visit. And you’ll be able to resume your day as soon as it’s done.

While sweating does help eliminate waste from the body, it’s safe to get Botox in your underarms (or elsewhere) before a big event, or even to continue the treatment indefinitely. It’s important, though, to consult a board-certified plastic surgeon who can rule out any underlying medical causes.

The art and science of plastic surgery are evolving every day, and the last year was particularly progressive. We saw rises in groundbreaking procedures like non-surgical nose jobs and CoolSculpting. Yet, for all of that innovation, the most popular procedures are relative mainstays.

According to the American Society of Plastic Surgeons’ (ASPS) annual report on plastic surgery trends, 17.7 million surgical and minimally-invasive procedures (such as injectables) were performed in the United States in 2018, which is up two percent from the previous year. (Figures from 2019 aren’t yet available.)

Botulinum toxin type A injections—better known by their brand names Botox, Dysport, Xeomin, and, introduced last year, Jeuveau—took the top spot for minimally-invasive treatments. According to the ASPS report, 7.43 million botulinum toxin type A procedures were performed in 2018, which is up five percent from just two years earlier and 845 percent since 2000.

As popular as ever

While Botox is used mainly to treat wrinkles, its enduring popularity can be attributed at least in part to the growing variety of procedures it can be used for, such as the treatment of hyperhidrosis (excessive sweating) and migraines.

That said, this latest wave of popularity appears to have more to do with the decreasing taboos around injectables. More patients are trying botulinum toxin type A for the first time, including more male patients and patients at both ends of the age spectrum. I’ve written a lot here in recent months about “Baby Botox,” which is a treatment that uses smaller doses of botulinum toxin type A as more of a preventative measure in younger patients.

Don’t call it a comeback

Somewhat more surprisingly, breast implants were the number one plastic surgery procedure in 2018, up four percent from 2017 and seven percent from two years earlier, according to the ASPS.

Breast augmentation has been the most popular plastic surgery procedure since 2006 (by a fairly wide margin), and while it seemed inevitable that that momentum would start to wane, implant innovation and advances in surgical techniques appear to have given the procedure new life. Most love the look of breast implants but were afraid of them feeling foreign. However, that concern is dissipating as the implants feel more and more like breast tissue.

As widely performed as both of these procedures are, it’s still critical that you seek out a board-certified plastic surgeon with extensive experience specifically in the procedure. In untrained (and even undertrained) hands, bad outcomes are still a possibility.