A doctor has opened up about the terrifying risks behind some of the most popular cosmetic treatments which most people are blissfully unaware of.
Fillers have grown in popularity in recent decades, and despite trends having changed from the Kylie Jenner pout to a more clean girl aesthetic recently, it has only meant that people are looking for more natural tweakments to enhance their looks or counter certain insecurities.
And while a lot can be achieved with dermal fillers and Botox, there can also be a lot of risks involved in these minimally invasive procedures too.
Dr Mo Hamed - also known as Dr Motox - revealed the most dangerous procedures on the Tea At Four podcast, and the precautions people should take before letting someone inject their face.
He revealed: "Everything is dangerous. Every single treatment has risks associated with it.
"Some of the riskiest ones are probably the ones that you’re not told are risky, for example lip fillers are super, super risky.
"If a little bit of filler goes into one of the blood vessels of the lip, it can block it. If it blocks it, the skin will die and your lip will fall off. But if it’s done safely, by someone who knows the anatomy and someone who knows how to reverse things where complications are happening, that just will not happen.
"So everyone always thinks that lip filler is safe, but lip filler - in my opinion - is probably one of the most unsafe places to inject."
While many people see lip fillers as a pretty low-risk procedure, the industry is terrifyingly very unregulated.
Currently, there are no laws restricting who can administer dermal fillers in the UK, though there is a push for this to change to ensure those that provide these procedures have relevant medical training.
Vascular occlusions can occur very easily in the lips, which are densely packed with tiny blood vessels, and which can cause tissue death if left untreated.
As Dr. Motox explained, a trained doctor will have the in-depth knowledge of the facial anatomy to prevent this happening, and the know-how to be able to quickly reverse it before permanent damage occurs.
And it's not just the lips - Dr. Motox added: "Other places are if you put filler into frown lines. Some people have really deep frown lines and normally I’d reduce that with Botox.
"But if you put filler into that area, there is a huge blood vessel that just runs up there so if any of the filler gets into that, you will go blind. So I don’t provide that treatment because the risk of blindness is just not for me."
Another risky treatment Dr. Motox refuses to perform is penis filler, which he does get requests for from time to time.
He explained: "I occasionally get requests for penis filler which is… So the idea is that it adds girth.
"I don’t provide that treatment but you can have it injected to add girth to the penis, which to me is wild.
"It’s such a dangerous treatment and I’ve never seen a medically qualified person offer that treatment. The only time I’ve seen it is like backstreet kind of people who shouldn’t really be doing it, and if you are having your penis injected, please don’t go to a backstreet person because that is absolutely crazy."
Explaining exactly why it's so risky, he added: "It’s such a sensitive area, things can go wrong super, super easily, the amount of nerves and blood vessels in those areas - if that is damaged, you’re screwed.
"If someone is injecting around there, you want to go to someone who really knows the anatomy of the area, and that won’t be someone in the back of a kitchen."
Needless to say, it's probably best to avoid getting filler injected below the waist altogether, but if you're looking to get a tweak to your face, as long as you're going with someone properly medically trained, you should be in safe hands if things do go wrong.