46, male, 5'6, 172lbs, does my body shape make me a candidate for butt implants? (Photos)

Dear aboudi, thanks for sharing your pictures and concern, after evaluate your case using small gluteal implants will a great natural look.
Make sure you go on consultation with a board-certified plastic surgeon. Hope this helps and best of lucks. Dr. Luis Mejia.

Thank you for your question. You are an excellent candidate for for buttock augmentation with implants. There are not many surgeons who are experienced at this. Make sure that your prospective surgeon can show you multiple pictures of buttock augmentation with implants. Best wishes to you.

Allow me to answer your question as best i can based upon your photos. However, please keep in mind that an in-person, or at least a virtual, consultation with physical exam is first necessary before any legitimate evaluation or final surgical recommendations can be made.

Based purely upon your photos and without any knowledge of your medical history, you indeed likely are a candidate for buttock implants as your best, more reliable and permanent option for buttock enhancement. Please read on:

There are currently only two FDA approved surgical options for augmenting the buttock/hip area: 1) Buttock and cosmetic Hip Implants (which are soft semi-solid silicone rubber implants that cannot rupture &/or leak) and 2)Brazilian Butt Lift (aka BBL) - which utilizes the patients own fat from liposuction then transfers this fat into the buttock. On the other hand, BBL using fillers such as hyaluronic acids, Sculptra, etc… is a dangerous, guaranteed waste of money, and is NOT FDA approved. So what it comes down to, like any surgery, is proper patient selection and long-term results. Implants provide the only guarantee for a sustained permanent result and tend to be ideal for perking up not only lean or deflated buttocks but also providing substantial projection to any butt, which is what every single patient wants. Typically a combination of sculpting the waistline with liposuction and augmenting the buttock provides the best chance for a long lasting and desirable perky contour. Based upon your photos and natural human anatomy, a Stanton Anatomic®️, NOT round, shape buttock implant may serve you best.

Unfortunately, fat typically melts away leaving disappointing results after 12 months, often sooner. Unless your BBL surgeon is injecting only 200 to 300 ccs of fat into each buttock cheek, a large percentage of that fat is going to die. Dead fat leads to dents and dimpling like cellulite, unevenness, loss of projection, and fatty necrotic oil cysts which are hard marbles and can be very tender
Unfortunately, because ~70+ % of the fat transferred will melt away within a year or two, most patients are not good candidates for BBL because they lack an adequate amount of fat to harvest. Beware, if a surgeon asks you to purposely gain weight (i.e. fat) before BBL, know that the fat you lose first as you get back to your baseline weight after surgery is that very same fat that was transferred into your buttock, hence your new buttock shrinks first, the fastest, and the most...so please do not fall victim to this recommendation. Even those patients that had adequate amounts of fat pre-operatively, still end up seeking buttock implants after a year or so because most of the fat transferred melted away leaving them with minimal result. Fillers such as Sculptra are cost prohibitive, provided enough volume is injected (i.e. at least 400 cc of active ingredient costing over $300,000) and last only 12 - 18 months. Additionally, any physician promoting “biostimulators” for buttock enhancement is just a joke, and any board certified plastic surgeon promoting such, should not be trusted with your butt. So, if you're looking for a reliable, predictable, and long-term permanent option that also provides projection in the central buttock, buttock are your solution. Please note that an extremely few number of board certified plastic surgeons specialize in buttock or hip implants, so you may need to travel far and away from home to find this particular surgeon. Glad to help.