Can the Muscle Walls of the Abdomen Be Tighten Without Having a Tummy Tuck? (photo)

Some people carry much of their fat around the organs in the abdomen (so called "visceral fat") more so than outside the muscle wall of the abdomen.  The visceral fat tends to bulge out the abdomen in people, and these people often do not have a lot of extra skin.  The only real way to fix that situation is through diet and exercise.

      The walls can be tightened without a tummy tuck, but you may or may not want skin removal.  To be honest with you, I cannot tell much from the pictures.  Find a plastic surgeon with ELITE credentials who performs hundreds of tummy tucks each year.  Then look at the plastic surgeon's website before and after photo galleries to get a sense of who can deliver the results.  Kenneth Hughes, MD Los Angeles, CA

It is sometimes possible to do just a muscle tightening. These photos are dark, but on viewing them I am not sur you would get enough of an improvement without removal of excess skin and fat.

Another issue can be that if there is a lot of tightening, the skin will be carried along and can buckle along the vertical midline if a skin release is not also done. 

Discuss carefully all options with your surgeon. Best wishes.

A tummy tuck involves 3 components:


Skin removal

Fat removal

Muscle tightening


One can choose to have all 3 components performed or just one or two.  Please have a discussion with your plastic surgeon to figure out what would work best for you.

Hi Chinadoll11550

The short answer is yes, abdominal muscles can be sutured together without doing a full tummy tuck incision. What is more important is whether you are a good candidate or if you will be happy with the final result.

Your photos seem to show global bulging of your abdomen. This could be due to muscle looseness or intra-abdominal fat. A good method of checking this is to see how flat your tummy is when you lie down. If your tummy is flat between your ribs and pelvis, you are still carrying a bit of fat on the inside, which will only be removed through diet & exercise. If you are concave (sucked in) when lying quietly, it is more likely to just be abdominal muscle weakness.

If you elect to proceed with muscle tightening only, your Plastic Surgeon needs to show you the 6 month or 1 year results of their last 10 consecutive patients (not just the good results). In my humble experience, patients are generally underwhelmed with the results of this procedure. They'd like to avoid the scar, but the contour change is less significant than can be achieved with a typical tummy tuck.

Good Luck

Dr Gavin Sandercoe