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Most people walk in asking for Botox. What they mean is “I want the lines between my eyebrows to
soften”. Three products do that job.
They are close cousins. All three are made from the same protein, and all three relax the muscle
under a wrinkle. None of them fills anything in.
The differences are small and worth knowing. They come down to how the product spreads and how fast
it appears.
The protein is the same. What is wrapped around it is not.
Botox and Dysport both include accessory proteins around the active molecule. Xeomin does not. That
is why some people call Xeomin the bare one.
Dysport spreads a little further from the injection point. On a broad forehead that can help, because
the result blends. On a small area near the eyebrow, that spread is the thing you want to avoid.
Dysport usually appears first, often inside two or three days. Botox and Xeomin take a little longer
to settle.
All three reach a similar place by the two week mark. That is when we look at the result properly.
Anyone who judges an injectable at day four is judging an unfinished one.
Not by as much as people hope.
For most people all three land in a similar range. How long yours lasts depends more on you than on
the brand. Muscle strength, how expressive your face is, and how fast your body clears the product all
move the number.
The plain version: switching brands to chase an extra few weeks rarely works. Switching because your
face responds better to one of them sometimes does.
That gets decided at the assessment.
We watch how your muscles move. We look at where your lines are at rest, where they go when you frown,
and how strong the muscle is on each side. Most faces are a little asymmetric, and that changes the
plan.
Then we talk about what you have had before. If a product worked well for you, there is rarely a good
reason to change it. If something did not work, that points us toward one of the others.
You can ask for a specific brand. We will tell you plainly whether it suits what you want.
Raise this at the assessment. It is one of the few times the brand choice is important.
A small number of people develop a reduced response over time. There are several possible reasons, and
not all of them are about the product. The first job is working out which one applies to you.
Bring the details of what you had and roughly when. That is more useful than any comparison chart.
None of them fills anything.
Look at the line that bothers you. If it is there when your face is completely at rest, that is
usually volume, and a muscle relaxant is the wrong tool. If it appears when you frown and vanishes
when you stop, that is movement, and these are the right tool.
Telling those two apart takes about a minute in person. It is hard to do from a photo of yourself.
If you are somewhere between curious and ready, book the assessment. It is where the brand question
gets answered, and you are not committed to anything by having it.
We offer Botox and Dysport at our London clinic,
along with Xeomin. Belita Savage, our nurse practitioner, does the assessment herself.
Stay informed with expert insights, treatment guides, and the latest developments in medical aesthetics from Nurse Practitioner Belita Savage.
