Swimming After Plastic Surgery: Dos and Don'ts

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Hey, Dr. Rick here for another question of the day. I get a question all the time about "When can I go swimming after having a procedure?" The bottom line is you, number one, want to make sure all of your incisions are well-healed before you start submerging them underwater. I generally don't allow patients to go underwater in the bathtub or swimming pool for at least three weeks after the operation. Being that said, if there are areas of the wounds that aren't healing to my liking, I may tell you, in your follow-up visit, or your other surgeons may tell you, that you need to wait a little bit longer. The bottom line is we want the incisions to be completely healed before we submerge them underwater, especially in patients who have breast implants, because we don't want implants to be susceptible to infections. So generally it's three weeks, but if you have any lingering complications, it could be longer, and that's really on a case-by-case basis. I hope this helps, and I'll talk to you next time.