Botulinum toxin is the bread and butter of aesthetics and has always been considered a generally safe procedure. However, new research has revealed that one in six patients suffer complications after having botulinum toxin injections.1 The research was undertaken by four doctors at the Royal Free and St Thomas’ hospitals in London; three were plastic surgeons and all were academic researchers. Dr David Zargaran, the lead author of the study, and his team found an overall complication rate of 16% when they analysed 30 studies involving 17,352 injections of botulinum toxin into the face. The most common complications involved localised skin reactions such as bruising (5%), headaches (3%) and facial paresis (2%) in which parts of the face such as the eyelid or eyebrow are paralysed.1 Problems with complication reporting have been highlighted previously, with a survey of 461 aesthetic…
