The landscape of aesthetic medicine has shifted dramatically in recent years. Gone are the days of frozen faces and overinflated lips – today’s patients seek subtle enhancements that preserve their natural expressions. Dr. Pedro Valente, CEO and Medical Director of The Skin Wellness Hub, brings over 23 years of experience to this evolving field, championing an approach that prioritizes natural-looking results.
Embracing the ‘Tweakment’ Trend
“Gone are the days where patients follow the social trends of celebrities,” Dr. Pedro explains. “Now they’re wanting more expression, essentially more of that rejuvenated rather than completely made-up look.” This shift represents what he calls the “tweakment movement” – where patients seek to look refreshed rather than dramatically altered.
Dr. Pedro notes a marked change in patient preferences over his two decades in practice. “A couple years ago, patients used to come in and get completely frozen,” he reflects. “That’s not the look that I was ever going to produce for my patients because it’s not something I like. I’m very communicative with my fingers and hands to express – why would I want to take that away from someone else?”
Introducing Bio-Stimulating Treatments
The field has moved well beyond basic neurotoxins and fillers. “Now we are going more into what we call the bio stimulators,” Dr. Pedro shares. “The biggest one is Profhilo, which helps with collagen formation and rejuvenation.” This represents a broader trend toward treatments that work with the body’s natural processes rather than against them. Another emerging treatment is platelet-rich plasma (PRP) therapy. “We’re utilizing your own cells of your body, grabbing at high concentration after extracting it from blood, and then injecting into certain parts of the body to utilize its growth factors,” Dr. Pedro explains. This approach helps improve contours and texture while adding natural-looking volume.
Advances in technology have revolutionized treatment precision. “Gone are the days where you used to utilize lasers that were more like a shotgun,” Dr. Pedro notes. “Now they’re far more precise – like a pico laser, which I explain to patients is more like a sniper rifle. They work in a far more targeted way, creating less thermal damage and less tissue damage around the good tissue.”
Saying “No” When Necessary
Perhaps most importantly, Dr. Pedro emphasizes the ethical responsibility practitioners have to their patients. “My hardest battle I’ve ever had in medicine was learning to say no to a patient,” he admits. “But once you know how to say it and you say it with dignity and care and absolute patient respect, we hope that the patients do understand.” This stance comes from seeing the long-term consequences of overtreatment. “Once you’ve stretched tissue, it doesn’t go back,” he warns. “That’s what patients don’t understand. Unfortunately later in life, what I’m doing is also doing things such as lip lifts and lip reductions to try and minimize that skin that’s essentially been overstretched.”
Prioritizing Mental Health
Modern aesthetic medicine increasingly recognizes the connection between physical and mental well-being. In Australia, practitioners are now required to use the Body Dysmorphic Syndrome questionnaire. “If the patient hits that radar anywhere on that questionnaire that shows any type of mental health concerns, then we say no and we are obliged to refer patients to psychologists first,” Dr. Pedro explains. “I understand what we’re trying to do – we’re trying to reverse back the clock of time,” he reflects. “We can help with that, but when you start overdoing it, you start really changing the aesthetics, you start changing the patient’s ethnicity, and you start changing absolutely everything about the patient.”
Through his practice at The Skin Wellness Hub, Dr. Pedro continues to champion an approach that enhances rather than alters, guided by the fundamental medical principle: first, do no harm. His work demonstrates that true aesthetic excellence lies not in dramatic transformations, but in subtle enhancements that respect each patient’s natural features and expressions.
To learn more about Dr. Pedro Valente and his approach, visit his website or check out his LinkedIn profile.
Credit: Dr. Pedro M Valente: Pioneering Advanced Aesthetic Techniques for Natural Rejuvenation – ValiantCEO
