How Much Weight to Lose Before Tummy Tuck?

I have found that many overweight patients have difficulty exercising because their extra abdominal fat and skin either gets in the way or makes them self conscious. In select patients, removing the skin with a tummy tuck increases their confidence and frequently stimulates them to start heading for the gym to lose the remaining weight. However, if you go on to lose a significant amout of additional weight, you may likely need a second operation to adjust your contour.

There are not absolute ways to determine this without an examination and body fat analysis. Generally the ideal body weight (estimate for a female) standing 5 foot 7 inches is 140 pounds. You can add 1015% for a larger frame.

Hi Sunshine, In general, the best results for abdominoplasty are achieved the closer a patient is to her ideal body weight. I try to encourage patients to get within 10 to 15 pounds of their ideal body weight. That being said, most patients are never able to get anywhere close to that weight, so it's not used as a hard and fast number. Just for your information, though when I refer to an ideal body weight chart, the ideal body weight for a small-framed women with your height is 123 to... more