Face and Neck
Not too long ago, plastic surgeons focused mainly on the effects of gravity and laxity to treat facial aging. The primary technique used to treat the sagging involved redraping the skin through a facelift in order to achieve a rejuvenated appearance. By pulling the skin tightly enough, surgeons were able to smooth out the wrinkles. Unfortunately, this required a lot of pulling in order to treat the midface (cheeks) and many patients were left with an unnatural "wind-blown" appearance.
Both surgeons and their patients were not happy with this, so many surgeons began to explore other options. "Deep-plane" facelifts are a popular alternative to the older redraping techniques. During this type of facelift, the surgeon redrapes the skin, but also moves the deeper muscles and other tissues of the face. This helps to provide a more natural appearance, and long-lasting improvement of the neckline. However, the improvement in the cheeks is often short-lived leaving many patients still desiring a more youthful appearance in their cheeks.
As surgeons have continued to seek out better techniques for rejuvenation of the cheeks there has been a new forcus on a second major contributor to facial aging. Besides gravity and skin sagging, surgeons are now focusing on the deflation, or loss of volume that occurs with facial aging. As we age, we actually loose some of the volume (mainly fat) within our face. So while we are gaining fat where we don't want it, we are losing it where we want to keep it! The majority of volume loss in the face is seen in the cheeks and temples.
To complicate things further, the fat that remains in the cheek tends to descend towards the fold that is created between the cheek and the upper lip (nasolabial fold). This fold becomes more noticeable due to the collection of descended cheek fat that rests above the fold. The groove between the cheek and lower eyelid (nasojugal groove) also becomes more prominent with the descent of the remaining cheek fat away from the eye.
Before you undergo go a face or neck surgery procedure, you will have an initial consultation with your doctor to discuss the changes that you would like to make to your appearance. The doctor will explain the options, the steps of the facial cosmetic surgery procedure, the different types of facial plastic surgery available, the risks, side effects, complications and limitations, and the costs.
Each individual facial surgical procedure varies in time and technique. Face and neck plastic surgery procedures include neck lift surgery (plastysmaplasty), nose surgery (rhinoplasty), ear surgery (otoplasty), lip augmentation, face lift (rhytidectomy), forehead lift (brow lift), blepharoplasty (eyelid surgery), cheek implants (malar augmentation), chin implants (genioplasty) and chin augmentation
Face and neck plastic surgery recovery times vary, depending on the type of surgery, the length and complexity of the face and neck operation, and the individual patient.
To find out more about Cosmetic Face and Neck Surgical Procedures, or to see if they are a good fit for you, contact us at 757.689.8258 or email us at evmsplasticsurgery@evms.edu today.