It has long been a hallmark of the aesthetic medicine that people are always looking to lose weight. This makes it all the more surprising that new techniques in fat treatment are gaining in popularity which are focused on putting fat back in the body instead of taking it out. The BBC reported that this year marked the first time in the that more patients were undergoing operations in order to inject fat into different areas of their body rather than use an operation to suck it out. While liposuction and tummy tucks remain popular options, these injections is toppling the scales on fat and beauty.
Fit or Fat?
The average person living in the United States and United Kingdom is much heavier than the average weight of the world and of their forefathers. The rate of fat reduction surgeries, however, has largely kept pace with the rate of fat retention over the past few decades. In previous years, nearly three thousand women in the UK alone sought to go under the knife in order to have fat vacuumed out of their midsection in the process of a liposuction. This figure, however, was surpassed by the number of women who want to get a fat transfer operation.
Age And Skin
There are several reasons to have a fat replacement treatment and not all of them have to do with aesthetic beauty. For older men and women, the quantity of fat in their face, hands, and feet drops with age. This makes skin drier and firmer, gives less cushion for impact, and leaves hands less able to deal with extremes like hot and cold objects. By injecting the excess fat around the waist and hips into the extremities of the body it is possible to look and feel younger with the additional fat in the facial features.
What Patients Choose
The overwhelming majority of patients seeking fat treatment, whether it is an insertion or an extraction, remain women. Nearly ten times as many women as men choose to have plastic surgery, while most men prefer nose jobs and eyelid operations rather than liposuction. Fewer men, as well, prefer to have fat injected into their hands and face. A total of forty thousand plastic surgical operations are conducted each year in the United Kingdom, with one in four being breast implants for women. The increase in fat injections has risen at about ten percent each year and seems to be holding steady.
What's In An Operation
Fat transfer is a fairly simple treatment. The side effects are reported to be minimal, with minor puffiness and swelling with the extra fat added to tight skin. Results can be seen quite quickly with the injection, since the fat quickly fills out the face and provides better volume to the area.
