Which is More Painful Between Breast Augmentation and Tummy Tuck?

With either procedure, you really should not have "pain." You will have discomfort, but pain should be adequately controlled with pain medications. With breast augmentation you there is discomfort from stretching the skin and muscles. With abdominoplasty, there is discomfort from tightness. However, this really should not preclude you from having the surgery. Good luck with your procedure.

Thank you for your question. A tummy tuck and breast augmentation are great procedures to combine as they address some of big changes that happen after pregnancy or weight changes. Typically the tummy tuck procedure has the more intense recovery process in terms of activity restriction and discomfort.  I would consult with a board certified plastic surgeon in your area to discuss your options in more detail.

My short answer is that neither procedures have to be particularly painful with the availability of Exparel, a long acting local anesthetic lasting at least 3 days in my experience. Both of the procedures can be done at once with a fraction of the discomfort. Exparel is injected during surgery in all areas of your surgery. This has made a huge difference in my practice. See my below link for more information

In my opinion, the tummy tuck has more discomfort and takes a bit longer to recover from. This is usually due to the tightening of the muscles that needs to be done in order to achieve a flat abdomen. That being said, after the initial 7-10 days, patients are feeling a lot better and more like themselves. I think the breast augmentation patients tend to feel better a lot quicker (3-5 days or so).
Good luck with your procedure!
Dr. Salemy

I have done each separately and many combined. Each individual is unique and some have felt the breasts were worse while others complained more about the abdomen. I would advise that you ask for a pain pump if your surgeon can provide this. The anesthetic can help ease the discomfort of muscle spasm for the first few days. I also would advise the use of a muscle relaxing agent such as valium or flexeril if you surgeon concurs.

Tummy tuck surgery is typically more involved than breast implant surgery and more painful.
You may want to talk to your surgeon about staying in an Aftercare wherer nurses can administer pain medications, and obtaining a pain pump, which delivers local anesthetic into the surgical area to greatly reduce postoperative pain.

Thank you for the question.  Pain really depends on each person's tolerance.  No one can really tell which one hurts more but most patients say they have more discomfort with the tummy tuck procedure.  Pain meds should be able to help you with that but like I said, it depends on how you tolerate or perceive pain.  Best of luck, Dr. Michael Omidi

Patients tell me that the tummy tuck causes more discomfort than the breast augmentation. If a scale is used from 0-10, where 10 is the worst pain. Breast augmentation patients tell me 5 or 6 for few days and a tummy tuck is 7 or 8 for a few days.

When I have combined both together patients usually don't feel the breast augmentation pain and only notice the tummy tuck. Also that is way I advise patients to expect it takes 1 week to recovery from breast augmentation (back to work) and 2 weeks for tummy tuck recovery.

Hello,
The pain from each is different. The tummy tuck pain tends to be more annoying which is one of the reasons to consider a pain pump placement at the time of a tummy tuck. Breast implants pain is more like pressure unless you go really large on the implant sizing.