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There is a question I get asked at almost every first consultation. “Can you just do my lip filler today?” 

The honest answer is: I could. But I won’t, and the reason matters. 

After twenty years as a dentist and four years now in facial aesthetics, I’ve stopped thinking of faces as a row of areas to inject. A lip is not a lip in isolation. It sits underneath a nose, on top of teeth, framed by cheeks, supported by a chin. Treat one feature without seeing the rest and you don’t get a better lip. You get a lip that no longer belongs to the face it sits on. 

So every patient who walks in for a consultation at Pennington Dental gets the same thing first. A full-face clinical assessment. At rest, in animation, photographed from front, three quarter and lateral angles. We look at the skeleton, the soft tissue, the skin, the way the

muscles move, the lip projection, and the bite. And then I write you a plan. Not a quote for one syringe.

What a full-face assessment actually involves

When I sit you down for a consultation, here’s what I’m reading: 

The skeletal foundation — the cheekbones, the jawline, the chin projection, the way the bone sits underneath everything else. Bone shapes the face more than anything else, and bone changes with age, especially after the menopause. If bone has gone, soft-tissue filler on its own won’t fix it. 

• The soft tissue — fat pads, ligaments, the way the face has settled. Different volumes have moved in different directions. Sometimes what looks like a wrinkle is actually descent. The treatment for descent is not the same as the treatment for a line. 
• The skin — texture, tone, hydration, elasticity, pigment, any active concerns. Even the most expertly placed filler looks dull on dehydrated, thinned skin. Skin quality is not an optional add-on. It’s the canvas. 
• The movement — what happens when you smile, frown, talk, chew. Muscles do work in groups. Relax one and another compensates. This is why I treat the upper face as a unit, not as three separate areas. 

The bite, the lip support, the dental dimension — and this is where my background changes the conversation. Tooth position and lip projection shape the entire lower third of your face. If you’re thinking about aligners, veneers, or wider dental work, that conversation belongs in the same room as the aesthetic one. Not down the corridor in someone else’s clinic.

Why the plan is written, and why it’s staged 

After the assessment, you leave with a written treatment plan. Areas, products, sessions, timing, expected investment, realistic outcomes. In writing. 

This matters for two reasons. 

First, it slows everything down. Aesthetic medicine has a long history of treatments being sold in the same visit they’re consulted in. That is not safe practice, and from June 2025 the regulators have made that explicit for prescription cosmetic medicines. Every patient at Pennington Dental has a face-to-face consultation with me as the prescribing clinician before any injectable treatment. There is then a minimum 24 to 48-hour cooling-off period. For larger plans, a full week. You are never asked to make a decision the same day. 

Second, it staggers the result. Faces don’t need everything at once. A good plan layers bio remodellers, polynucleotides, conservative filler and toxin over weeks and months, with

photographs and review at every step. The work builds. You can dial back at any point. Nothing is rushed.

What I don’t do, and why that’s part of the offer 

I don’t run flash sales on prescription cosmetic medicines. No Black Friday filler. No Instagram discount codes. No group treatment events. 

These are clinical procedures, not retail products. Selling them on price puts pressure on patients to make decisions they may regret, and on clinicians to compress timelines they should be protecting. 

I also won’t treat anyone in active body-image distress, or anyone showing screening flags for body dysmorphic disorder. Sometimes the clinical answer is no treatment at all, and saying so is part of my job. 

A face that still looks like yours 

The goal of any plan I write is the same. Balance, harmony, and a face that still looks like yours — just rested, supported, and properly looked after. No one should be able to tell what you’ve had done. You should look at yourself in three months and think I look like myself, just a better version. Not I look different. 

If you’d like to start a conversation about a full-face assessment, you can book a consultation at Pennington Dental Stratford-upon-Avon. We’ll take an hour, look at everything together, and you’ll leave with a written plan you can take away and think about. No pressure to decide on the day. 

That’s the only way I work. And I think, once you’ve experienced it, it’s the only way you’ll want anyone to work on your face.