Facelift

Facelift is really multiple different operations depending on your needs. Different people need different adjustments depending on their specific anatomy. Facial aging affects us all differently depending on multiple factors including age, sun exposure, heredity, illness, weight gain or weight loss.  A facelift (called rhytidectomy) is designed to reduce the signs of facial aging and thus restore appearance to how you may have looked 10 or 15 years earlier.  How successful the result is depends on how your tissue has aged or been damaged especially by the sun.  Many times it is simply your heredity beginning to catch up with you as you see yourself in the mirror.  Facelift per se does not affect your forehead, eyebrows or eyelids.

Facelift works best for men or women whose skin has begun to loosen or sag but who have still good skin tone and underlying bone structure.  Heavily wrinkled skin can be tightened but wrinkles may still be present.  Other treatments such as laser, Thermage, chemical peel, Botox and Restylane filler can help greatly in those situations.

Complications from the various types of facelift are not common.  Bleeding or blood collecting under the skin requiring drainage after surgery is dramatic but rare.   Damage to the nerves that animate the facial muscles is also quite rare.  Infection and poor or visible scars can also occur.  Dr. Topol will discuss with you where the scars are placed for your specific facelift.

The standard or full facelift involves incisions that extend from the temple in front of the ear around the earlobe behind the ear and into the hairline behind the ear.  In a short scar technique, the incision can be shortened considerably.  Normally, a small incision is also placed under the chin to access the front of the neck.  Occasionally, liposuction of the neck is performed and injection of fat into the face under the skin can be done if needed.  The incisions allow access to the tissue deep to the skin to be tightened and re-draped.  Then the overlying skin is re-draped and the excess is removed.   Facelift works best to tighten the neck and improve the sweep of the jaw line by removing the jowls.  It works less effectively as you go up the face to the cheeks.  Restylane injections work very well to improve the line from the nose to the corner of the mouth (the nasolabial fold).

Surgery usually is done under sedation but general anesthesia can be used.  Patients can go home after surgery but many elect to stay overnight to allow the nurses to help “recover” them rather than rely on a friend or relative.  Pain is not usually severe.  A drain tube is placed under the neck commonly to drain tissue fluid for a few days.  A large head wrap is applied at surgery to help compress and re-drape the skin.  This stays on for a few days and is then replaced with a special compression garment that is worn at home and at night for a few weeks.  Bruising and swelling may persist for 2 or 3 weeks.  Remember, facelift does not stop the aging clock—it just sets it back.  If you have questions or would like to schedule a consultation with Dr. Topol, please give our office a call or send us e-mail.