The golden ratio is considered an important concept for treating the face in medical aesthetics, and in terms of lip treatments it refers to where the lower lip should be 1.6 times thicker than the upper lip.1 While this is true for the Caucasian face, it does not apply to all ethnic groups.1
Certain skin colours, in particular black skin patients, genetically have greater lip volume as they age. This is due to increased melanin in darker skinned patients, which helps protect the skin against ultraviolet radiation and cause the skin to be protected throughout the patient’s lifetime, shielding the skin against damage to the DNA2 and ultimately resulting in patients of racial origin having a greater lip fullness.3 Skin of colour is also less prone to solar elastosis, a degenerative condition of elastic tissue in the dermis due to prolonged sun exposure, which causes the skin to become…
