Plastic Surgery Cosmetic Surgery

The effects of aging are inevitable, and, often, the brow and forehead area show the first signs. The skin begins to lose its elasticity. Sun, wind, and the pull of gravity all affect the face, resulting in frown lines, wrinkling across the forehead, and an increasing heaviness of the eyebrows. Even people in their thirties may have faces that look older than their years. Your tired, angry, or sad expression may not reflect how you actually feel. As a result, many people have opted for a procedure known as the forehead lift. Based on variations in how men and women age and on new advances in medical technology, different methods are used to perform this procedure.

A coronal forehead lift
It involves an incision across the top of your head, from ear to ear. Through this incision, your surgeon can alter the muscles (frontalis, procerus, and corrugators) that cause horizontal forehead wrinkles and scowling. After doing this, your surgeon will actually remove about a 1-2 cm strip of your scalp and sew the remaining scalp together. Although this may sound gruesome, it is the oldest and most reliable technique in brow lift surgery.

You will be required to stay in hospital overnight, to take 7 -10 days off work and to sleep upright for one week to reduce swelling. It will be important to minimise irritation to the scalp by washing the hair daily with baby shampoo and avoiding styling products. The sutures will be removed between seven and fourteen days.

Brow lifts can also be performed using ’suture’ or ‘threadlift’ techniques. This involves the placement of sutures or threads with tiny ‘teeth’ into the brow through a small insertion. The threads are pulled upwards and secured, and the insertion is stitched shut.

Types of Brow and Forehead Lift

• The Endoscopic Brow Lift – the newest technique available. Plastic surgeon uses an endoscope – special surgical equipment; a tiny television probe. Advantage of this technique is that no scalp tissue is removed; corrugator muscles only partially. Plastic surgeon places only 4 small incisions within the hairline. Disadvantage is that is might raise your hairline by about one-half inch. This technique is the most common technique. All our plastic surgeons are trained to use the endoscopic equipment.
• The Coronal Brow Lift – the traditional approach. Plastic surgeon makes an incision across the top of the head from ear to ear. With this technique plastic surgeon removes corrugator muscles (muscles that cause frowning) and excess scalp. Disadvantage of this technique is that the scar is placed across the scalp and is longer than the one after the endoscopic brow lift. There are also more problems with prolonged numbness of the scalp

Post-Op information - Endoscopic Browlift
After the procedure, patients may experience some numbness, swelling or discomfort at the incision sight. This is normal and usually will pass with time. Incision site pain is usually minimal, but can be controlled with medication if necessary. Swelling can be treated with cold compresses for the first few days.

Within two days you should be up and about, although you should continue to take it easy. On the first morning after surgery your bandage is changed. Over the next few days you will be able to change your bandage as instructed. Within a week, stitches and clips are removed and within two weeks surgical pins are removed. Within three weeks most of the visible signs of surgery should be gone but is it not unusual to have some swelling.

Brow lift surgery usually lasts between one and two hours. It is usually performed in an outpatient facility with local anesthetics and sedatives to relieve tension.

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 20th, 2008 at 10:49 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.