Facial fat transfer: Are antibiotics required?

Thank you for your question and I appreciate your concern. I recommend you schedule a consultation with an experienced, board-certified dermatologist with extensive experience in fat grafting. Discuss your concerns and medical history with your provider to determine whether you can safely have fat transfer without the use of antibiotics. In many cases, a doctor will agree to that protocol if the risks of using antibiotics outweigh the benefits.

Fat transfer results are permanent, but not all fat will survive. Harvesting is important to fat transfer. I use water-assisted fat harvesting which gives pure fat to transfer and combine with platelet rich plasma (PRP) to get the most viable and sustainable fat cells. This can be combined with Sculptra, depending on treated area, to improve outcomes. Antibiotic prescriptions depend on the physician and patient, it is often the safest option post surgery. I recommend getting a formal evaluation with an expert. Best, Dr. Emer

Thank you for your questions. I appreciate your concerns and motivation to avoid antibiotics. In our office, we usually give a very short course of antibiotics. Because the face is so vascular, the risk of infection is very low. I recommend scheduling a consultation with a board certified Plastic Surgeon who is experienced in fat grafting. Based on your specific anatomy, how much fat needs to be grafted, and where the fat would be harvested from, they can come up with a good plan for you that may or may not include antibiotics. In our office, we offer 3D imaging to give our patients an accurate idea of what their final result will look like. Good luck!

my best guess is that 75% of plastic surgeons would use a short course of anabiotic's starting immediately before the procedure for facial fat transfer.  Facial procedures have an extremely low rate of infections. When infections do happen they can't be devastating so even if there's a marginal difference we tend to lean towards using antibiotics.  If there is a significant risk to using antibiotics then it seems very reasonable to not use antibiotics for this procedure.  Scientific evidence has shown that a single dose of antibiotics lowers infections for most elective and surgical procedures.  The decrease in infection rate is still fairly small.  In general the infection right after surgical procedures hovers around 1/2%.  Certain procedures have a much higher infection rates. Like I said earlier, facial procedures tend to have lower infection rates.  Make sure you disclose your full history to any future providers.  It's also important to get assessed as to what facial fat transfer can or cannot do for you.  This procedure is by its very nature somewhat unpredictable and imprecise.  Some people benefit from having the same procedure a few times to build up the ideal amount of fat.  This may be especially true for someone who has lost a lot of facial volume.  Personally I believe fillers are far superior to fat transfer but I completely understand why it said transfer seems appealing. It's important to understand the limitations as well.  Best, Mats Hagstrom MD