Questions about Cosmetic Treatments

What are injectable cosmetic treatments?

Any treatment where you are injected with botulinum toxin or a dermal filler.

Common trade names include Botox ®, Vistabel ®, Azzalure ®, Xeomin ®, Dysport ®, Radiesse ®, Juvaderm ®, Restylane ®. The trustworthy manufacturers include Allergan, Merz Aesthetics, Galderma and Q-Med.

Our Quality Standards cover both botulinum toxin and dermal fillers.

What is so different about them?

  • Botulinum toxin
    is a powerful prescription-only drug licensed for medical purposes. It may only be prescribed for cosmetic use in person by a registered licensed doctor, a registered dentist, or a registered nurse who has completed an Independent Nurse Prescribing Course.
  • Dermal fillers
    although not prescription drugs, pose many potential dangers if used wrongly. In recent years deliveries of both from doubtful sources of supply have been reaching untrained non-medical amateurs, who have caused many a patient to be unhappy about poor quality treatment.
  • Why can’t just anyone administer cosmetic injectables?

    Injections carry the risk of introducing infection and or damaging nerves and tissues and or giving an allergic reaction. In the hands of appropriately trained doctors, dentists and registered nurses this risk is much reduced. Beauty therapists, for example, do not have the knowledge or skills or independent legal right to safely administer prescription-only drugs.

  • What’s so special about doctors, dentists and registered nurses?

    They know about the body and how it works, and about medicines. They work to professional standards set by the three statutory professional bodies, the General Medical Council, the General Dental Council or the Nursing and Midwifery Council. They can be disciplined or lose their registration and thus their livelihood (“be Struck Off”) if they breach professional Standards. Professionals have appropriate insurance.

    Administering botulinum toxin, a powerful prescription-only drug, unless legally permitted to do so, can be considered equivalent to driving while uninsured, with the patient as the passenger.

  • What is the Treatments You Can Trust Register?

    It’s about your safety, first and last. It is designed to re-assure patients seeking injectable cosmetic treatment that it will be given by a trained clinical professional in appropriate surroundings.

    Only clinics that have satisfied The Registrar that they meet the Quality Standards are admitted to The Register.

  • What must a clinic do to be on the Treatments You Can Trust Register?

    Prove to The Registrar that it has people appropriately trained, and premises suitable, to meet the industry Quality Standards. The clinic must always be ready for surprise inspections by The Registrar. It must re-certify annually when it pays its fees to the Treatments You Can Trust Register.

  • How do I know if the clinic I am considering reaches these standards?

    It will display the Treatments You Can Trust Quality Assurance Mark in a prominent place.

  • How can I find a clinic with the Quality Assurance Mark?

    You are in the right place. You can look for a clinic in your area, or to find a practitioner whose name you know:

    We believe those clinics which do NOT display the quality mark should be doubtful entries in your shopping list.

    Is this Register is a trade protection device designed to keep the little clinics out? No. It is a patient safety device for your benefit. Application Fees are affordable for any size of clinic, no matter how small.

  • Where is the Government in all this?

    The cosmetic injectable industry has long argued that there is a need for full Government regulation but the Department of Health has clearly stated that full regulation was not an appropriate or cost effective way of offering patient protection.

    The Treatments You Can Trust Register of Injectable Cosmetic Providers has been established as an alternative way to safe guard patients.

    It had modest start-up funding from the Department of Health and was advised by the Better Regulation Executive and the Council for Healthcare Regulatory Excellence (Now the Department for Business Innovation and Skills - BIS). All have expressed support for the Treatments You Can Trust Register.

    The Register allows patients to identify appropriately qualified practitioners - doctors, dentists and registered nurses - to ensure that they choose a provider who can safely administer these treatments.

    With no other Register on offer and the only alternative being an unregulated system, the Treatments You Can Trust Register is the only responsible way forward.

  • So clinics on the Treatments You Can Trust Register are not more expensive because of their high standards?

    Probably. The difference is quality. Clinics on The Register are as concerned for patient safety as for profit. Those who cannot meet the Standards (so are not on The Register) may well be ripping you off for high profit, after cheap treatment, careless of your welfare.

    Yes, but I know someone who gives home treatment at an amazingly low price. Ask why they do not have the Quality Assurance Mark. Ask where they bought the drugs. There are unscrupulous suppliers of doubtful quality drugs, cheap, on the internet. Nor should you expect to be injected with someone else’s leftovers.

    Clinically clean premises are the right place for injecting under your skin, not some domestic room.

    Remember:- Quality Assurance Mark = safe.    No quality mark = danger.

  • What must a doctor, dentist or registered nurse do to be admitted on the Register?
    1. Must be registered and licensed by the doctors’ professional regulator, GMC, and/or must be registered with the dentists’ professional regulator, GDC; or registered with the nurses professional regulator, NMC. We do NOT register anyone else and advise patients not to submit to treatment by anyone not a doctor, dentist or registered nurse.
    2. Meet the Health Education England qualification requirement which, in short , requires Graduate or post-graduate training in cosmetic injectable substances.  We say:
      • The clinician must have the appropriate clinical qualifications to make a safe assessment as to the suitability of treatment based on the medical history of the patient prior to the commencement of any treatment. Clinicians should be able to demonstrate to patients that they are trained and competent to perform the procedures. The clinician must have the appropriate training to meet Health Education England requirements for the treatment intended, or appropriate national equivalent qualifications to meet the standards.
  • What happens if I have a concern about my practitioner?

    To be on our Register, practitioners and clinics must demonstrate they have a complaints process freely available to patients.  It must feature a means for the patient to make their complaint known; and then to be sorted if possible locally.  If you cannot agree, then it provides for a complaint to be looked at by Head Office; or, if there is not one, to go to us at Treatments you can Trust.  If not finished then, your complaint goes to the independent Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution (CEDR) for mediation.

    See our Complaints page for more information.

  • What if your complaint is about the professional conduct of your practitioner?

    Put simply, have they put your welfare first and foremost? If you believe they have not, you have the right to refer your complaint straight to a statutory Professional Regulator (i.e., one set up by Parliament).

    We may also do this if we think that what you have told us merits us doing so.

  • Tell me again who I can trust to give me Botox or dermal fillers

    An appropriately qualified registered doctor, dentist or registered nurse in a premises displaying the Quality Assurance Mark – it’s the only safe way.

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