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  • Local vs. General Anesthesia for Facelift Procedures
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Male Voice: Facelifts have been done for a long time, actually for over a century now. What people I don't think realized is that it was kind of co-discovered by not only plastic surgeons, otolaryngologists but a dermatologist named Marie Noelle from Paris at about 1916 and she did one of the facelifts, although it was skin only. So it's been around for a long time and in cosmetic surgery or aesthetic surgery, it's been one of the key stone procedures.

I like the procedure because in my opinion and when I do it, I can consistently get predictable good results and it makes a significant difference in rejuvenation, so I like it for that reason. However, traditionally, it's been done with general anesthesia which has longer downtime and recovery time and may have more risks and it's not only me but as one of the pioneers. There are a number of surgeons who about a decade ago started doing it under local anesthesia. We used something called tumescent anesthesia which had been developed by another dermatologic surgeon named Jeffrey Klein in the 1980s and we applied that for facelifts and by using the special tumescent anesthesia.

I also do oral sedation so the patients a little bit woozy but with the special anesthesia, I can do it under local. So the patients are awake but woozy and they bleed less. I feel that they have less downtime. They still get excellent results, but less bruising and just excellent results and slightly less invasive than previous types of facelifts.

Local vs. General Anesthesia for Facelift Procedures

Doctor Hayes B. Gladstone addresses which anesthesia is safest for facelifts and why it's important to decide on local vs. general anesthesia for facelift procedures.