A plastic surgery clinic that does face lifts well? Re:本 explains.

Hello. This is Re:本 Plastic Surgery, located at Exit 1 of Sinsa Station.

Before getting into today’s main explanation, let’s first read a recent story from a patient who contacted our clinic a few days ago.

| I’m looking into a face lift because my mother in her 60s seems to have low self-esteem due to sagging skin.​As I’ve been gathering information, I’ve also gradually become interested, even though I’m in my 40s.​Do people in their younger years, like me, also get a full face lift?​Since the surgery time is quite long, I’m a little worried, and I’m also curious about what conditions I should consider to have a successful operation. |

A face lift is a lifting surgery that pulls up the facial skin as a whole.

Because of that, the surgery time is relatively long at 3 to 4 hours, and the incision area is wide, so even if people are interested at first, quite a few end up feeling burdened and turning to procedures such as ultrasound, radiofrequency, or thread lifting instead.

Still, the reason face lifts continue to attract steady interest is probably because of these two points:

△ It can lift the entire face, not just one area

△ It has a much longer maintenance period and superior lifting effects than any other method

As mentioned earlier, the patient asked whether a face lift is possible even in the 40s.

What age is a face lift suitable for, and how should it be done to achieve safe results?

If a face lift feels 부담스러운, what surgical lifting options can serve as alternatives?

A face lift should be done like this.

If you look at the Chinese characters for face lift, it uses the characters for face (顔), face (面), lift (擧), and above (上).

In other words, it means “a surgery that lifts the skin of the face upward.”

However, looking at it only this way could be misleading.

On the surface, human skin may seem to be just the tissue covering the outside, but if you examine what lies beneath in detail, you can see that it is made up of six layers.

The top layer is the epidermis, followed by the dermis, fat and connective tissue, reserved fat, the SMAS (fascia), and muscle.

These complex tissues make up layers thicker than the epidermis, so would lifting only the outer epidermis really create proper skin lifting?

Of course not.

In particular, the very thin layer called the SMAS (Superficial Muscular Aponeurotic System), which exists between the reserved fat and the muscles, is vulnerable to gravity and gradually sags downward over time.

It may be easier to understand if you think of this SMAS layer as the reason deep cheek fat or deep wrinkles appear on our skin.

In the past, only the skin was pulled up and fixed, so it was difficult to improve deep wrinkles, and even if there was immediate lifting, it would sag again over time, making it hard to maintain the effect for long.

As a result of various studies conducted during that process, it was learned that this SMAS layer is the cause of wrinkles and the fundamental sagging of the skin.

From that point on, face lift surgery has been performed by lifting the SMAS layer together with the skin.

Why face lifts are difficult

However, sensitive nerve tissues are located directly beneath the SMAS layer, so care must be taken during dissection to avoid damaging the nerves.

If the SMAS layer has been safely dissected, it is pulled upward appropriately and fixed, then the overlying skin tissue is also pulled up, the remaining tissue is trimmed, and the incision is sutured.

In general, people worry a lot because face lift incisions tend to be large, but at Re:本 Plastic Surgery, we make the incision in areas hidden by hair and use an oblique incision direction that does not damage the hair follicles, so if you have thick hair, you can cover the incision area while you recover.

Even so, what if the incision area, long procedure time, and financial burden still feel too heavy?

The “temple lift” (Three-Step Temple Lift) that I’ll mention next can also be a good alternative, so please keep that in mind.

If a face lift feels burdensome, consider a mini lift...

The Three-Step Temple Lift performed at our clinic is a type of mini lifting that can pull up sagging tissue in the lateral face.

Compared with a face lift, the surgery time is shorter at around 1 to 2 hours, and the incision only needs to be made near the temple, so it is less burdensome.

The Three-Step Temple Lift also lifts the SMAS layer together, and because only a small incision is made in an area hidden by hair, it is barely noticeable after surgery.

Accordingly, it may be worth considering for people whose outer eye corners are sagging, or who want to improve sagging cheekbones and the side contour.

There is a common perception that face lift surgery is for people in their 50s or 60s and older, but in fact, the most suitable time is around the 40s.

If the skin is excessively sagging, too much tissue must be removed, and accordingly there are many more factors to consider, which often makes the surgery more complicated.

However, the 40s are when skin aging begins to accelerate, so if you make corrections in advance at that time, you can maintain healthier and more elastic skin later in your 50s and 60s.

Perhaps that is why we have been receiving quite a few inquiries about face lift surgery from people in their 40s to early 50s recently~^^

If a face lift feels burdensome, there are various alternatives such as a forehead lift or the Three-Step Temple Lift, so we hope you can visit without pressure and receive a consultation.

Whatever you ask, we will kindly answer.

That’s all for today’s post. We’ll see you again with something more useful in the next post. Thank you.

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