Can a Full Body Lift Be Done in Seperate Surgeries Instead of One?

Thank you for the question.

Yes a full body lift can be done in separate stages or in a single stage depending on the specific situation. The patient and/or surgeon may have reasons to prefer one route over the other.

It would behoove you to seek consultation with well experienced board-certified plastic surgeons to address your specific concerns.

Best wishes.

Web reference: http://www.poustiplasticsurgery.com/weightloss.htm

My preference is to perform both the Abdominoplasty and Body Lift together in one stage.  I find in my hands it is far more cost effective and easier in terms of a single recovery for both procedures to be performed together.  In addition, most patients usually require additional procedures such as a breast lift, facelift or thighlift, which can more easily be performed at the second stage surgery.  Find a surgeon who performs several of these a year and look at several pictures of patients. Getting the scars to look as even as possible is a priority in my practice.

Web reference: http://stlcosmeticsurgery.com/

What are the basic principals of body lifting in general?

1)  excise the most lax skin possible,

2)  do it with a minimum of complications,

3)  make it look nice.

Separate procedures allow you to maximize the skin resection in each area.  Combining procedures (i.e. tummy tuck with lower body lift) tends to make the surgeon be more conservative with one of the areas of skin resection, for fear of wound separation.  It's a matter of competing priorities and skin tension.

Studies clearly show that longer surgeries (combined) tend to have more post-op complications (hospitalization, transfusion, DVT/ PE, etc.).  Using a team approach with different surgeons can reduce the time, but has the disadvantage of sometimes LOOKING like different surgeons did different things!

Of course, fewer surgeries is more convenient for the patient.  

It's a trade-off.  I prefer to do a better, safer job with multiple procedures.  

Should a body lift be one surgery or multiple.  MULTIPLE usually.  Certainly if a member of my family had a body lift I would want it staged.  Long involved surgeries come with MORE complications.  Be smart and go the staging route.  Pain control is also much better.   Dr George Commons, MD

Yes, There are logical reasons to perform complex multi-part surgeries in stages.  Length of time under anesthesia, the necessity of turning the patient over multiple times, adverse tensions on adjacent anatomical regions, and incapacitation of the patient all have to be planned.  Possible complications, as well as predicated results must be considered.  Corrective secondary surgery,  such as a scar improvement may be  done with the second stage procedure.  

The patients pot massive weight loss will need body lift and lower body lift. I prefer circumferential body lift at the first setting and do the lower body lift 3-6 months later. Dr. Michael's  explained it very well.

Every surgeon has their own preference for combining or separating procedures. I prefer to separate upper and lower body lift procedures. The main reason for this is that the tension for the lower body lift is in the opposite direction as the tension for an upper body lift. Since the procedures pull against one another, I feel I cannot optimize the tension for either procedure meaning you may have some residual skin laxity. The advantages of staged procedures is that the surgeries are shorter and the recovery quicker and it will also give the opportunity to make any revisions to previously performed surgeries if needed. The down side is that it may cost slightly more to do separate surgeries and you need to take time off a second time.

I hope that helps. Good luck

Dr. Joseph Michaels