Lift Your Look: Silhouette InstaLift Explained with Dr. Gidon Frame

In this special episode of “Anti-Aging Insights,” Dr. Teri Fisher is joined by Dr. Gidon Frame to delve into the fascinating world of Silhouette InstaLift thread lifts. Recorded live during one of their weekly Instagram sessions, this podcast sheds light on the process, benefits, and ideal candidates for this innovative anti-aging procedure. Learn how these Health Canada approved threads provide non-surgical facial lifting and collagen stimulation, offering a compelling alternative to traditional facelifts. The episode is rich with information and practical insights, complete with before-and-after case studies and personal testimonials from the doctors themselves. Whether you’re a potential client considering a thread lift or just curious about the latest in aesthetic medicine, this episode promises valuable knowledge and expert advice. Don’t miss out – tune in and discover how Silhouette InstaLift can revolutionize your approach to anti-aging. For visual aids and additional details, visit Dr. Teri Fisher’s Instagram profile.

Today’s Guest

Dr. Gidon Frame

Dr. Gidon Frame is a kind, ethical and compassionate doctor and one of the most experienced and respected cosmetic injectors in British Columbia. He has a wonderful “chair-side manner” and a good sense of humour, which immediately puts his patients at ease.

Dr. Gidon Frame’s mission is to manage and reverse total body and brain aging, while optimizing facial rejuvenation. He also has a passion for preventative medicine.

Dr. Frame loves to coach and teach people how to make their face, body and mind “shine”. He is a University of British Columbia Clinical Assistant Professor and often gives educational talks to the general public. After 13 years of performing regular, cosmetic injectables and laser treatments, Dr. Frame has become recognized as an expert and teacher of balanced aesthetic rejuvenation.

Episode Summary

In this special episode of “Anti-Aging Insights,” Dr. Teri Fisher and Dr. Gidon Frame share their expertise on Silhouette InstaLift thread lifts, a popular and innovative non-surgical procedure. Highlighting the benefits, applications, and process of this treatment, they dive into how it stands as a great alternative to traditional facelifts.

The Silhouette InstaLift is notable for being the only Health Canada approved thread lift, using threads that last about two years. Dr. Frame explains that these threads contain two needles, which are designed to produce a mid-face lift while also being used off-label for lower face and neck lifts. The threads are made from PLLA (Poly-L-lactic Acid) and act as bio stimulators to stimulate collagen production, creating a double benefit of lifting and enhancing skin strength.

Dr. Fisher provides insight into the procedural steps, starting with an in-depth assessment and marking of the face, followed by the insertion of the threads with minimal discomfort due to local anesthetic. They discuss the stacking technique where five threads per side are used to create a more significant lift due to the additive effect of having multiple threads parallel to each other.

Both doctors emphasize the suitability of candidates, noting that ideal patients are those who already have sufficient volume in their face and are looking purely for lifting. They also reflect on the quick recovery time, with most patients experiencing minimal downtime and being able to return to their normal activities soon after the procedure.

Visual results are highlighted through real patient before-and-after photos, showing significant improvements in the jowl and marionette areas. The discussion underscores the dual effect of the thread lift – immediate lifting and long-term collagen stimulation.

In conclusion, Dr. Fisher and Dr. Frame invite listeners to visit their clinic, Anti-Aging Medical and Laser, in Vancouver, BC, for a personal consultation to see if they are good candidates for the Silhouette InstaLift thread lift. They encourage checking out Dr. Fisher’s Instagram for visual references and further engagement.

Key Insights

• Thread lifts, particularly the Silhouette InstaLift, serve as a less invasive alternative to traditional facelifts by using threads with cones and knots to mechanically lift facial tissue.
• The Silhouette InstaLift threads are Health Canada approved and can last around two years while also stimulating collagen production, unlike PDO threads which dissolve in a few months.
• The thread lift procedure involves assessing the face, using local anesthetic, inserting the threads in a stacking technique for better lift, and then securing them by pulling and anchoring the threads.
• Ideal candidates for thread lifts are individuals who have sufficient facial volume and do not need more; it offers effective results particularly for mid and lower face lifts.
• Recovery from a thread lift involves minimal social downtime, with full results and collagen stimulation appearing about three months post-procedure, and some care needed in terms of minimizing major facial movements for a few weeks after the procedure.

Episode Transcript

Dr. Teri Fisher: Hey there and welcome to this podcast. Today we have a little bit of a different podcast. As you may know, if you follow along the Instagram profile for our clinic, Anti-Aging Medical and Laser, we do Instagram live broadcasts every Wednesday afternoon. And this past week I was doing a thread lift on the patient and then Dr. Frame and I decided to do an IG Live together, where we discussed the process of thread lifts, a little bit about how they’re done, the benefits, who makes a good candidate for a thread lift, and I thought why reinvent the wheel when I can share this particular Instagram live as a podcast episode?

So you will hear a Dr. Frame speaking a lot of time with myself. Uh, adding in various aspects to this conversation. And I think it’s got a lot of great content and it is very educational when it comes to thread lifts. So if you are thinking about a thread lift or, you know, somebody who’s thinking about a thread lift, I think this episode will have a lot of valuable information for you.

My apologies for the audio quality because, uh, the audio quality is not quite as good as what you’re hearing right now, because we did not have a dedicated podcast microphone at the time. Nevertheless, I think the content is great and I hope you will enjoy it. So with that being said, here is Dr. Frame and I speaking about, uh, thread lifts, and if you want to see some of the visuals that we refer to, feel free to check out my Instagram profile, Dr. Teri Fisher, where you can see some of the before and afters on my profile that we are speaking about.

All right with that said let’s, uh, let’s get right to.

Dr. Gidon Frame: Hello there, Dr. Gidon Frame, Dr. Teri Fisher. Here we are at Anti-Aging Medical and Laser Clinic in beautiful Kitsilano, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Our weekly IG Live. And today, Dr. Fisher and I are going to talk about the Silhouette InstaLift.

Silhouette InstaLift, as you may or may not know, is the only Health Canada approved thread. These threads last about two years. I am extremely happy with them because I love doing them. Dr. Fisher likes doing them, and I have them in myself. So I thought we’d just quickly go through the basics. This is how the threads look. They’ve got two needles, one on each side. They look like really long, but actually the length is about 11 centimeters, the part that’s in your face. So a lot of the PEO threads are quite short, but these PLLA threads are about that long and they can go this area, this area, this area. They are designed for mid face lift and off label, which is where we use them the most, is lower face lift. We also occasionally use them off label for neck lift. But let’s talk about how you enjoy doing the procedure.

Dr. Teri Fisher: Yeah. So this is a, a great procedure, as Dr. Frame said, for, for lifting. When you think about things that can potentially cause or help with lifting, one of the things that comes to mind for people is a facelift. And so it’s an option. People weigh a surgical procedure of the facelift versus something like this, which is much less invasive than having a complete surgical procedure.

The way that this works, the way that we do it, it looks like a thin fishing, um, fishing line almost, with a couple little knots and a couple little cones. And the idea behind that is that once we insert it underneath the skin, and I can explain how we do that in a moment, we anchor those cones and it actually pulls up on the tissue and that’s how you get the mechanical lift.

Dr. Gidon Frame: The cone grabs. If you look closely, you’ve got a cone that moves around and then it goes over the knot and grabs onto the knot in the tissue and then forms a one way barb and it’s a completely circular, it’s actually a three dimensional barb and then that holds tissue up and stops it lifting down. But unlike PDOs which dissolve in three to six months, these puppies here actually stimulate collagen, they are bio stimulators. So they’re not just lifters, they’re bio stimulators. Same stuff PLLA is what Sculptra is made out of, which bio stimulates in the skin. So I found it a fascinating technology, and so easy to put in, and comfortable to put in once you learn, and we have learned.

Dr. Teri Fisher: So the way it works is we obviously do an assessment first to see where the threads would most likely have the greatest effect. We mark everything on the face, we clean everything on the face, make sure everything is nice and clean. We use a little bit of local anesthetic in a couple of the places where we’re going to have the needles and where the threads are going to go in, similar to what you would get at a dentist’s office if you were having any type of dental work. And, I can just describe a little bit here. What you’re seeing here is the thread that is being pulled through a small little hole that’s been made with a needle. Again, this has been frozen, so it’s very comfortable for this patient, as you can see. And I’m pulling the thread out through the top, and also then through the middle and out through the bottom. So we’re inserting it from the middle, going out the top and the bottom. Once that is done, we’ve got all the threads in place, and we recommend five per side.

Dr. Gidon Frame: So, here’s my jowl, and Dr. Fisher did this very cheek on me, about a few months ago, and he kindly put 5 threads running from my jowl, over here, over there, up into my hairline. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Why did you put 5 all together?

Dr. Teri Fisher: Five is known as a stacking technique, and we find that, it comes down to physics, when you have more threads parallel, 5 is better than 4 is better than 3, you’re gonna have more force and you’re gonna be able to get greater lift in that area. And so it just comes to to simple physics.

Dr. Gidon Frame: It’s cumulative and it works well in this area. Whereas previously with the first generation of threads that we started a few years ago, we used to put 1 thread here, 1 thread here, 1 thread here, spread it out. You get a little bit, a millimeter, millimeter, millimeter. Here you get an additive effect, so you get actually quite a few millimeters of lift from the five stacking together.

There’s also another advantage, these are bio stimulatory, so whenever there was a thread, we’re now gonna get collagen stimulation within three months. You get an added bonus, like a kick in at three months. You get the lift effect immediately and then the kick in of the collagen stimulation at three months.

Dr. Teri Fisher: And I think I heard you say that if you think about it, you’ve got 5 close together in a row, you essentially end up with a band of collagen supporting that area of the face.

Dr. Gidon Frame: So I’ve got 2 bands of collagen right along here. Fantastic. It’s just helping hold me up. My jowls would be hanging down on my shoulders if I didn’t have this thread lift, InstaLift, Silhouette InstaLift thread lifts going up like this over here.

People say who cannot get a thread? Is there anyone that shouldn’t get a thread? Well, somebody who’s too young. They don’t have enough tightness. Somebody who’s too old. They’ve got too much skin laxity and it’s not going to do enough. And those people either must do machines or must probably go on and do surgery at that stage.

The ideal thread lift candidate, Silhouette thread lift candidate, is somebody who’s already got fill, they’ve got enough volume and they don’t need more volume. If you need volume, okay, you can put volume with fillers in your cheeks and in your cheek lift, back lift, up lift, and at the same time get some lift.

But if you already got volume or you don’t want more volume in your face and you just want lift, Silhouette thread lift. Perfect. And you can get more lift with the thread lift than you can with a lifting filler.

Dr. Teri Fisher: Absolutely. Again, it comes back down to physics, where it’s just, you’ve got a mechanical device that’s literally giving you that lift, that’s anchoring and pulling it up. Yeah.

Once the threads are in, then with the needles are coming out of the holes, we then, we literally tighten them by pulling on the threads, and then and we anchor it into the tissue so that it pulls up, and then of course we snip off the ends of the threads…

Dr. Gidon Frame: …and the threads stay inside.

Dr. Teri Fisher: And there you go.

Dr. Gidon Frame: How long do you think the procedure takes?

Dr. Teri Fisher: Half an hour to an hour, I would say. Yep, yep. Um, depending of course on how many threads.

Dr. Gidon Frame: From skin to skin, you know, um, consultation time can take 20 minutes, half an hour, depending on, on, on your circumstances. Once we actually get going on the number of threads, uh, it’s actually quicker when they’re all stacked together.

If you have to go all over the face, it takes a little bit longer. And, uh, yeah, half an hour to an hour is good. You know, that, that’s kind of the range. But probably door to door, coming in, walking out, an hour and a half. And, uh, here’s not much better lift you can get anywhere else with an hour and a half in a clinic.

Show us some of your before and afters.

Dr. Teri Fisher: So, this is one patient who has kindly said that we can share her pictures and you can see the before and the after photos. What you’ll notice, again, is particularly this area here, the jowl, where they are a little bit more pronounced on the before picture and here…

Dr. Gidon Frame: I like the marionette and the marionette line there. The marionette area over there. And now it’s smoother over there.

Dr. Teri Fisher: Absolutely. So you look at the marionette and you look at the contour of the jaw, how this is straighter as opposed to the jowling that you see.

Dr. Gidon Frame: In this lady, did you do jowl? Did you also do mid face?

Dr. Teri Fisher: This was all strictly, uh, from jowl.

Dr. Gidon Frame: All strictly from jowl. It looks like the apex of her cheeks. Here the apex of the cheeks is here at the level of the tip of the nose. Here the apex is a little bit higher. So it looks like the cheeks have actually been lifted so that we’re now looking at a more full cheek over there compared to over there. And she’s got the same wry smile. It’s not like she’s smiling more, but for sure that cheek is a bit lifted. So you’ve got actually quite good mid and lower face lift from lower face.

Dr. Teri Fisher: And this was with five threads per side as we talked about.

Dr. Gidon Frame: Excellent, excellent.

Dr. Teri Fisher: And this is today. Today? This was today.

So, again, same, same deal. Immediately after. Look at this marionette line here and here, and how they’ve almost disappeared. And look at the jowling here, particularly on this side. Well, both sides. And you can see that the jawline looks much straighter without that jowling. And that is immediately after the procedure.

Dr. Gidon Frame: Before. Procedure was done. Straight after, she looks comfortable, she’s got a little bit more rosy cheeks. Here are the entry points. There’s five entry points over there. You can’t really see them from the front view, which is great. From a 45 view, you would be able to see them.

Dr. Teri Fisher: You might notice a little bit of the skin is a little bit paler. That’s from the local anesthetic, which has a little bit of epinephrine in, which helps to control any of the red stuff.

Dr. Gidon Frame: So for most people, there is downtime. There’s social downtime, but you know, if you’re not fussed about marks and stuff, I had no problem. I went straight from having my thread lift and I went off to a meeting. The two of us went off. Dr. Fisher did my face and we went off down to a meeting to go and see a demo on something else.

And some, some of the doctors there looked at me a little bit strange, but the downtime was not much. But, you know, To be safe, if you’ve got a meeting with the king or the queen, uh, be it whatever country you want, or you’ve got a hot date, or you’re getting married, you want to leave some time. I would say you need two to four weeks, to be safe, because there can be a little bit of marking at the entry points and maybe bruising as well.

Results last about two years because this actual PLLA thread breaks down and then the collagen that is stimulated and made, holding you in place, that lasts about two years. Some longer, some less. It depends on the person’s own metabolism. But the Sculptra, which is the filler, the injectable filler that’s made out of the same material lasts also about 2 years.

So we do know that the collagen that is produced from PLLA is actually quite long lasting. And that’s pretty good. Not permanent. Permanent threads they tried. They failed dismally. They snapped, they shifted, they moved, they came out, they created distortion. Not a good idea. I’m not a great fan of permanent non surgical interventions.

I like things that grow, that stimulate, and then slowly wear away, and you can pop it up then after two years or so.

Now people sometimes ask, uh, what should I do afterwards? Like, how do I look after myself after a thread lift? Well, don’t take a huge bite from an apple. For a few weeks, you should avoid major facial movements, uh, because that will stretch the skin. Firstly, it’ll feel a bit uncomfortable because things will move around and you’ll feel the thread catching. And secondly, you’re not going to snap the thread, but you could shift it and nothing bad is going to happen, but you could lose some of the benefit of the lift and the hold until the threads settle in, make their way, become part of your body and start to stimulate collagen.

So, there we have it. Dr. Fisher and I, Dr. Gidon Frame here at the Anti-Aging Medical and Laser Clinic. We’ve been chatting today about our Silhouette InstaLift Thread Lift, a way to non surgically, office procedure, hour and a half, come in, either of us will be able to design your face, put threads in, lift up your jowls, lift up your mid face, and maybe an off label tighten up your neck. Minimal downtime, easy to tolerate, and you’re out and you’ve got a nice lift without filling and overfilling and giving you that pillow for the face.

So come along to Anti-Aging Medical Laser Clinic, contact Dr. Teri Fisher or myself, Dr. Gidon Frame, and book yourself up for a consult and come in for a Silhouette InstaLift.

Dr. Teri Fisher: Well there, you have it. I hope you enjoyed that podcast episode. I hope you learned a ton about the Silhouette InstaLift thread lifts. And as Dr. Frame and I were talking about, if you want to learn more, have a consultation with us, feel free to reach out to us at the clinic.

Again, just to remind you, if you want to see some of the visuals that we were speaking about during this episode, feel free to check out my Instagram page as well at Dr. Teri Fisher, D R T E R I F I S H E R.

Until next time. I hope you are well, and I’ll talk to you again very soon.