Face Tightening After Facelift?

Without being able to examine you, it's difficult to recommend a treatment that could meet your ideal needs. Ulthera is a great treatment to help upkeep a facelift, as it works to tighten and tone minor sagging skin without surgery. If you're skin is drooping excessively, another facelift may be a viable option. Subtle volume augmentation may also be needed with fillers or fat grafting. I recommend consulting with an expert facial plastic surgeon to determine the best course of action.

I've tried a number of techniques that are noninvasive to "tighten" the skin. This includes laser, ultrasound, and radiofrequency. I don't think they work. I think this website will demonstrate that as well.

Thank you for this interesting question. The durability of a facelift has many factors. Among these are your skin and soft tissue characteristics, but also the surgical technique. Skin-only facelifts and SMAS plication lifts may not be durable enough for thick-skinned individuals. A deeper level of dissection, such as a deep-plane facelift, may be a good option for a longer-lasting, natural-appearing result. You should discuss this with your qualified facial surgeon.

     Ulthera could certainly be considered.  There are no hard and fast rules on intervals between facelifts.  I like to see at least 2 to 5 years out of a facelift, but it may be reasonable to do more often.  Discuss these items with your plastic surgeon.

It is rather unusual to see someone at age 55 with olive complected skin to have to undergo 2 or 3 facelifts by that age.  The skin on the neck is usually more lax than the skin on the face because the skin in the neck is tightened from behind the ears.  A conservative revision face/neck lift will help tighten any excess skin and retighten the fascia and muscle layers underneath the skin.  If there is sagging in the cheek area, cheek implants should be considered.

Ulthera and other skin tightening devices will probably improve the tissues by about 20%.  Without an exam, it is hard to say what would be good.

 As we age there is often a loss of volume in the face. This is often interpreted as droopiness or sagging. May I suggest you first get some photographs of when you were younger. Has there been a loss of volume in your face?? Look at the features that made you attractive like prominent check bones or well defined neck line. Consider taking these pictures with copies of your operative report to a ASAPS member familiar with facial rejuvenation with fat grafting at the time of face lift in your area. We have some examples of patients that have had such procedures on our web site in photo library 2.  Best,

 

Gary R Culbertson, MD, FACS

 I have performed Face Lifts for 25 years and the answer is as often as jowls appear and the skin is loose.  The issue might be to remove excess fat and add shape to the cheels as well as removing loose skin.  Ulthera, lasers and Radiofrequency may shrink the skin several mm's but none will tighten the skin the equivalent of a Face Lift procedure that removes 1-2 inches or more loose skin (25 mm's per inch).