Do Fat Injections Work As a Facelift?

It sounds as if you have had many temporary fillers and some semipermanent fillers.

Our philosophy about fat injections is that fat that is used for fat injection is first obtained by a suction process.  This damages the cell walls of many of the fat cells.  The fat is usually centrifiged at high speed and then injected through a needle.  It is no wonder that most of the cells that are injected are already dead when they are injected. The viability of fat injection specimens varies from 5% to 25% in carefully done studies.  Our studies were done with dye exclusion methods and showed viability around 20-25% in very carefully harvested specimens.  Other studies done with metabolic uptake methods showed viability much lower.  Some studies that just use microscopes to tell how viable cells are are not, in my opinion, valid because they are not exact enough.

For this reason, we use primarily nontraumatized fat fascial grafts for facial volume augmentation.  These consist of strips of tissue that are untraumatized when they are harvested.  They are then placed in pockets within the face.  each area is treated slightly differently and has certain requirements and limitations.  We have termed this process LiveFill(TM). 

In patients your age who are noticing the changes you describe, a facelift is usually necessary to achieve the best result, along with the grafting technique above.  However you have decided not to have "surgery", so fillers alone will still give you a good result, just not the best result.

There are many fine surgeons in the Los Angeles area, and it is wise to consult with several you feel to be the best before making your final decision.

please do not get fat injections on the face.  They are a total waste.  I can understand that at 48 you are not ready for a facelift even though that may well be the best option.

I have been doing fat transfers to the face for over 7 years. Patients who have a lot of thinning but good skin tone may get by with fat grafting alone to rejuvenate them. Patients who have thinning and a lot of skin aging as well as laxity of the tissues will typically not get as much improvement with the fat. The simple way to view this is: fat is great at treating the thinning problem, not great at treating sagging due to skin and facial laxity.