Under-Eye (Tear Trough) Fillerin Seoul

Darkness under the eyes has several causes, and filler answers only one of them. A hollow groove casts a shadow, and filling the groove lifts that shadow out. Brown pigment, and thin skin that lets the purple of the muscle beneath show through, are color problems. Gel does not change color, and in thin skin it can add a bluish tone if it sits too close to the surface.

Eye bags are the second common mix-up. Fat that bulges forward below the eye creates a pouch with a groove underneath it. Adding gel under a large pouch can make the whole area look heavier, so the size and shape of the bag decide whether filler is worth trying at all.

Fluid is the third factor. Hyaluronic acid holds water, and lasting puffiness is the delayed problem reported most for tear trough filler with this material (Trinh, 2021). Skin that already swells easily under the eyes is a reason for a cautious first amount.

Tear trough filler is a cross-linked hyaluronic acid gel. The same molecule occurs naturally in the skin's supporting matrix; cross-linking slows the rate at which the body breaks it down, and an enzyme called hyaluronidase can dissolve it if the result needs reversing. That option to reverse is the main reason hyaluronic acid is the material studied for this area.

Depth is the central technical choice. The skin below the eye is among the thinnest on the face, and gel placed too superficially can show through as a bluish-gray tint, known as the Tyndall effect, or as a visible ridge. Published techniques place the gel deeper, near the bone of the orbital rim, in small amounts. Either a fine needle or a blunt-tipped cannula can deliver it. A meta-analysis of prospective trials found the side-effect pattern differed by tool, with bruising tied more to needles and swelling more to cannulas (Nikolis, 2023), and those differences belong in the conversation before injection.

Technique itself is not standardized. A systematic review of tear trough methods found no clear safety or outcome difference between needles and cannulas and wide variation in how injectors work, which kept it from naming a preferred approach (Rao, 2022). What stays constant across methods is restraint: the trough is a small space, and an overfilled groove looks puffy in a way that a slightly underfilled one does not.

The overall evidence is encouraging. A 2023 meta-analysis found tear trough hyaluronic acid injection had a low complication rate and high satisfaction (Liu, 2023). Those studies pool many products and injectors, so they describe the method in general and do not single out any gel on this clinic's price list.

Four product pairs are on that list, each charged per 1 cc. The right pair for the tear trough depends on how soft and smooth the gel needs to be for your skin, and that choice is made once your under-eye area has been examined in person.

Under-eye filler is billed by the amount of gel used, at a set rate for each 1 cc of the product pair you choose. The tear trough takes a small volume next to areas such as the chin or nose, so the cc count on your quote is the figure to check first.

Card prices leave out Korea's 10% VAT; the second figure on each card already includes it, and the tax is charged when you pay. Three of the four pairs carry a retouch note on the price list. When a retouch can be booked and how much gel it covers are not printed, so have both written on your quote before you commit to dates.

Hyaluronidase dissolving has two lines. One covers gel placed at this clinic, and the other covers gel injected elsewhere, where the product used may be unknown.

The area under the eye combines thin skin, a loose fat layer and nearby blood vessels, which gives it a specific risk list:

• Bruising and swelling, which the clinic's guide puts at 1 to 2 weeks.
• Tyndall effect, a bluish-gray tint where gel sits too close to the surface.
• Lumps, ridges or uneven sides that show in certain light.
• Delayed or long-lasting puffiness under the eyes.
• Infection, or an inflammatory reaction that appears weeks or months later.
• Blocked blood flow if gel enters or presses on a vessel, which can damage skin.
• Rarely, vision loss when filler travels into arteries that supply the eye.

Vision loss after filler is rare. A literature review traced most reported cases to injections between the brows and on the nose, while still calling for ways to reduce the risk wherever filler is used (Kato, 2022). For the tear trough specifically, a systematic review of delayed complications found swelling was the main issue with hyaluronic acid and stressed giving people accurate information beforehand (Trinh, 2021).

Contact the clinic at once if the skin turns white, gray or mottled, pain keeps climbing, or you notice blurred vision, double vision or a dark patch in your sight. Hyaluronidase can break down hyaluronic acid gel, and speed matters in a vascular event.

The before-and-after photos on this page were taken at the clinic. How a tear trough responds depends on skin thickness and the depth of the groove, so results vary from person to person.