Ultrasound improves outcomes significantly in many ways. It allows us to avoid vascular structures in critical areas that are very superficial or very deep, which is where we normally place fillers. Many Injectors think that going down to bone is often safe, but there are studies that show that * in 1% or more of patients, the angular artery runs along the periosteum.

**The most frequent location of both the superior and inferior labial arteries was the submucosal plane (58.5%) followed by intramuscular (36.2%) and subcutaneous (5.3%) planes. The depth of the superior labial artery in the upper lip was 5.6 ± 0.13 mm whereas the depth of the inferior labial artery in the lower lip was 5.2 ± 0.14 mm. Both arteries were more frequently located within the red lip: upper lip (83% vs. 18.7%) and lower lip (86.2% vs. 13.8%).

If we know precisely where the artery is, we can either inject superficial or deep to it and avoid those vascular complications.

It’s also very critical to use ultrasound for injections around the nose, because it’s highly vascular in that area and injections in the wrong place can cause blindness. It’s safer to use ultrasound to see where the structures are so we can avoid them for safer procedures.

Overall, ultrasound enables us to inject with confidence because we know where to inject the filler. And in the case that there is a vascular complication, we’ll be able to identify it quickly and dissolve the pocket of filler using ultrasound guidance and eliminate the vascular occlusion very quickly and easily.