| Patients increasingly opting for micro liposuction |
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| Saturday, 16 September 2006 | |
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But advances in surgical techniques and equipment had led to an increase in popularity of micro liposuction and with it, a new lexicon of terms used to describe the problem areas that patients now want to address. These include the "buffalo hump" (upper back), the "doughnut" (around the belly button), the "piano legs" (calves), the "wings" (around the bra area), the "muffin top" (lower back), "banana fold" (below the buttocks), and the "chubb." (the area around the kneecap). Technological improvements in recent years have seen the introduction of ultrasound machines, which break up the fat before it is extracted, and smaller, more accurate cannulae, the hollow tubes used to dislodge and remove fat, allowing surgeons to provide micro liposuction. Because of the clinical risks in removing too much body fat, surgeons do not recommend liposuction for the morbidly obese. However, it has been widely used to reduce bulges in the typical problem areas. But as the precision of the procedures has increased, liposuction is attracting a new type of patient who wants to improve almost perfect physiques already honed by diet and regular exercise. "Some of them are perfect 10s who want to be 10½s," said Dr. Howard D. Sobel, a New York City surgeon. "These patients' 'before' pictures are what patients in the past wished their 'after' pictures looked like." Surgeons say that operations for "lesser corrections" are technically and aesthetically more challenging because the areas that are not so fatty require more experience and wider anatomical knowledge. For example, ankles have superficial nerves and arteries that can be damaged, fat on the back or kneecap is very fibrous and can be difficult to remove evenly and kneecaps have sac-like cavities that can be easily traumatized. One surgeon recently saw a patient who wanted to have liposuction of her pubic area. "In Brazil, bikinis are very small, and she complained that a little bit of fat stuck out over her bikini," he said. Doctors are concerned that these micro procedures may create a demand for serial liposuction in which patients become "liposuction junkies" and view surgery as a maintenance technique, like fitness. "We already have a model for this with Botox and Restylane, where people go to their doctors every few months to get another shot whenever they feel like it," one said. "Maybe liposuction will become like a gym membership where you pay a doctor $10,000 for the year and you can have as much surgery as you want." |
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