Smoking before BBL surgery?

Definitely stop smoking! Smoking reduces circulation to the skin and impedes healing.  It is best to avoid smoking, including second hand smoke, and cigarette replacements, such as nicotine patches or gum, in the perioperative period.  While you should ideally stop smoking for 2 weeks before and 2 weeks after your BBL, you must NOT smoke for a minimum or 24 hours before and 24 hours after surgery.Kenneth B. Hughes, MDBoard Certified Plastic SurgeonLos Angeles, CA

Smoking is associated with a higher risk of complications with surgery. It is extremely important that you do not smoke for at least 4 weeks prior to and after surgery. Depending on your surgery and other individual factors, your Plastic Surgeon may recommend delaying surgery until you have ceased smoking.

Thank you for your question. Unfortunately, smoking while you are recovering from any surgery may delay the recovery process or even cause some complications. It is best to avoid smoking while you recover. Best of luck!Dhaval M. Patel Double board certified Plastic surgeon Hoffman Estates Barrington Oakbrook Chicago 

I appreciate your question.



I require my patients to stop smoking 8 weeks prior surgery as well as 8 weeks after surgery.  Nicotine is a vasoconstrictor and can cause too many post operative problems -- delayed wound healing, fat necrosis, etc,The best way to assess and give true advice would be an in-person exam.

Please see a board-certified plastic surgeon that specializes in aesthetic and restorative plastic surgery.



Best of luck!



Dr. Schwartz



Board Certified Plastic Surgeon



#RealSelf100Surgeon

Active smoking (even 1 cigarette a day) prior elective cosmetic surgery like a BBL can result in serious complications like infection, necrosis of the fat ( fat goes away) wound dehiscence, etc. Therefore, patients must have stop smoking ("quit cold turkey) at least 1 month before surgery. 

It is recommended to quit smoking prior to your surgery. Most of us require 4 weeks of no smoking prior to your surgery and is for your own good. Smoking increases your surgical risk and can cause increased fat death. You can quit anyway that works for you but you need to quit. If you are unable to, you should discuss this with your surgeon and think about rescheduling your surgery.

The nicotine is what is bad for you. Nicotine causes constriction of the small blood vessels. This means decreased blood flow to the fat that is going to be transferred and less of it will survive (more volume will be lost over time than would be if you did not have nicotine in your system). Each cigarette (or E cigarette or patch, gum etc) leads to ~60 minutes of decreased blood flow. That means that smoking 2-3 cigarettes/day will lead to several hours of decreased blood flow. You don't want to spend all of this money just to have the fat not take. It is best to have absolutely no nicotine in your system 2 weeks before surgery and 2 weeks after surgery at a minimum. 

In our practice we would require 4 weeks of no smoking before proceeding with a BBL.  Be honest with your surgeon. Quitting completely is best.  Best wishes.

Thank you for the question. This topic does come up often. It should come as no surprise that smoking is very bad for you. There are a hundred good reasons to quit, and yet, most patients find it very difficult to do so. When it comes to ANY surgery, smokers will have a much higher risk of poor wound healing, infection, and scarring than non smoking patients. When it is applied to tissue transfer: skin grafts, hair transplantation, and buttock fat augmentation, the risks are even WORSE. The reason is that tissue transfer requires passive diffusion of oxygen to the tissue to keep it alive until a new circulation can be established ( neovascularization ) . This process can take a week or longer. Smokers have a severe reduction in the amount of oxygen their blood can deliver based on the amount of carbon monoxide in the smoke. Carbon monoxide has a 40x affinity for hemoglobin over oxygen. Hence, even a very small amount of smoking is harmful. So, yes, you MUST quit cold turkey, or expect less than desired results. As always, best to be healthy, no smoking, and make sure any health concerns you have are managed by your primary care md.

Best to you. 

Cigarette smoking increases the chance of complications from surgery.

Certain procedures have a massive increase in complications and heavy smokers.

The impact of nicotine is worst on procedures were blood supply is changed.

These include abdominoplasty, facelift, breast reduction and breast lift procedures.

With these procedures heavy smokers can have it has highs of 50% major complication or risk just related to cigarette smoking.

Many plastic surgeons will not perform any of these procedures on heavy smokers.

All surgical procedures have increased complications from smoking though the impact of nicotine it's not as severe on other procedures.

No one can give you an exact number or percentage of what the impact will be of smoking before or after your procedure but it is highly recommended that you abstain from all tobacco products or nicotine supplements before and after your procedure.

The absolute worst thing you can do is to have a cigarette immediately before surgery or immediately after.

Ideally patients should quit several months before the procedure and up staying several months afterwards.

At a minimum up staying two days before the procedure and for a few weeks after.

Please be honest and discuss this with your plastic surgeon.

It's not fair to either the patient or the doctor to have unforeseen complications that could've been avoided.



Best,

Mats Hagstrom M.D.