You are here: Home / Archives for liposuction side effects

Laser Liposuction Risks

For a long time liposuction has been one of the most popular of plastic surgery procedures. With the introduction of laser assisted liposuction the procedure opened up an option to a whole new market of people who have considered smaller treatment that did not warrant the full risks and surgical procedure that comes with traditional liposuction. Laser liposuction offers many benefits and further reduces the risks of a procedure already generally regarded as a relatively safe cosmetic enhancement procedure.

The Concept of Liposuction Surgery

The difference between laser liposuction and traditional liposuction is in the technique. The concept of liposuction remains intact with laser liposuction. Fat cells are broken from underneath the skin and loose fat is sucked up through a tube known as a cannula.

Traditional vs. Laser Liposuction Technique

Laser liposuction uses an optic fiber through which a laser is beamed. The heat generated by the laser literally melts the fat and a small cannula is inserted into the area to remove the liquefied fat. This is a much gentler form of fat removal.

Traditional liposuction causes more stress to the surrounding tissue because physical force is used to break up fat cells. The tube used to suck out the loose fat is larger than the one used in the laser technique.

The size differential of the equipment involved speaks a lot to the scale of the surgery. Laser liposuction is useful for small scale procedures that could not be performed in the past because the traditional method is relatively brutal compared to the finesse and accuracy of using a laser charged optic fiber.

Common Liposuction Risks

Being a more gentle and precise procedure, laser liposuction reduces or even eliminates some of the most common problems that have historically plagued liposuction procedures.

Bleeding Risks

One of the biggest problems that surgeons have reported is the excessive bleeding during the surgery. In many instances a blood transfusion is required to supplement the patient’s blood loss. Meanwhile, using a laser greatly reduces this problem because the procedure causes less damage to surrounding tissue and the small amount of blood that might leak from damaged capillaries are often dried by the heat of the laser.

Improper drainage of leaked fluids is the biggest contributor to complications that hamper the recovery period. It can cause hematomas or seromas where blood pools under the skin to cause a visible discoloration or color spots. Patients of laser assisted liposuction can expect to recover much faster as a result of the reduced blood loss.

Surgical Risks of Liposuction

Although rare, serious surgical risks such as internal organ damage are a very real possibility. This is not an issue with the laser technique. Risk of infection to the incision area is also much reduced because the equipment is much smaller and therefore requiring a small incision. That also shortens the required recovery period and reduces the possibility of unintentional scarring.

Anesthesia Risks

Anesthesia related risks are always an issue with any surgery. There is a danger in improper dosage as well as using the wrong solution. A certified anesthesiologist is required for large doses which can be expensive. Laser liposuction patients usually only require local anesthesia meaning only the treated area is numbed. This means the patient is awake during the procedure so any excessive discomfort can be communicated to the surgeon while the surgery is in progress.

Side Effects of Liposuction

Some of the most common problems with liposuction, though not particularly dangerous but aesthetically unpleasing is skin irregularities. This happens when too much fat under the skin is removed leaving grooves and dimples in the skin. The way to avoid this is by dividing a large treatment into smaller multiple treatments. That way smaller amount of fat is removed at a time. The risk of skin irregularities is not an issue with laser liposuction because the method in itself is a small scale procedure.

Managing Plastic Surgery Risks

All surgery comes with inherent risks and liposuction is no exception. Liposuction, with laser or traditional method, is a procedure to remove pockets of fat in areas that are hard to eliminate through exercise and dieting alone. It is not a weight loss strategy and should not be treated as such. Any patient considering the procedure must understand the limitations and risks of cosmetic surgery. Unrealistic expectations can lead to dangerous addictions to plastic surgery and it is up to the surgeon to ensure that the patient has an achievable goal in mind before beginning the surgery.

Liposuction Scars

Liposuction scars are very real risks for any patient. In fact, scarring is an inherent risk with any plastic surgery procedure because the incision makes that area prone to problems such as scarring and infection. The good news is that scars, although unsightly, are not particularly dangerous to a person’s physical health. A scar is an area of the skin where a fibrous material replaces the normal skin after an injury, or in this case, a surgery that causes too much trauma to the skin.

The thicker tissue does not function like the normal skin with all the sweat glands and hair follicles but serve the purpose of closing a wound or opening in the skin that would otherwise be prone to infection. Different liposuction techniques that have been developed recently have improved on traditional methods and reduce the chances of producing visible scars significantly. There are also non-invasive or non-surgical liposuction options available as well that could almost entirely eliminate the risk of scarring.

Scars are caused by damage to the skin. Just about any injury would result in a scar and what people really care about is the visibility of the scar. Minor injuries will scar but to a degree that is not visible. In general terms the deeper the wound, the bigger the scar will be. Liposuction scars could occur from the incision area where the skin does not close up properly resulting in a visible scar. It could also be produced from underneath the skin when the tools used in liposuction are operated too close to the surface of the skin from the underside. This can damage the deeper layers of the skin which could produce a scar.

Although rare, laser liposuction introduces a new risk of scarring that could result from burns. The burning of the skin could occur when the heat generated from the laser is too great and the laser is not moved to a new location. This burn under the skin could produce a scar although this is really rare, very uncommon, and requires near-intentional delinquency from the surgeon. More realistically, laser lipo reduces the risk of scarring since incisions required to perform the surgery are smaller and the precision of the laser technique reduces the amount of harm caused to nearby skin tissue. That is why it is a popular technique used in specialty procedures like breast reduction liposuction where scarring must be avoided as much as possible for best results.

For those who want to avoid liposuction scars there are non-surgical options available. These are only effective for tiny deposits of the fat since only trace amounts of fat can be removed at a time through non-surgical treatments. Some techniques use a needle to inject a chemical solution that causes the fat to melt away. This liquefied fat is picked up and removed from the body by the body’s natural cleansing process. A popular version of this injection technique is Lipodissolve. Another method is known as Thermage, which is the use of a laser to target fat cells and melt them without surgery. It is different from laser lipo which inserts a laser-charged fiber to melt the fat and suction the fat out of the body. Thermage does not suction the fat and only melts trace amounts so that the body can cleanse the melted fat through natural cycles of removing toxins from the body.

Scarring is a very real risk of any surgical procedure and liposuction scars, although rare and usually mild are still possibilities that anyone considering plastic surgery should be aware of. The good news is that any scar can theoretically be removed. A popular treatment is laser skin resurfacing which basically removes a thin layer off the top of your skin revealing the fresh, young skin cells underneath. Multiple sessions will remove enough skin to eliminate some skin problems such as acne and other scars as well as damaged skin cells and wrinkles in the skin.