Nip This Tuck That

Beverly Hills Plastic and Cosmetic Surgery “Tip of the Day” from Dr. Francis R Palmer, III Beverly Hills Plastic and Cosmetic Surgeon.  Threads, strings and prongs for Face Lifts oh my.

 What’s the deal with threads, strings and those pronged devices for Face Lifts and Neck Lifts?

 Seems every other day there’s some new device that promises to lift and tighten the face from a distant incision without removing skin…is this possible..even probable?  Oh, I don’t know let’s take a look at see if we can’t figure this out.

1. If you have loose skin and muscles of the face, that’s true you are a candidate for a Celebrity Lift (I’ve mentioned this before) a Face Lift and or a Neck Lift.  But what does a string, thread or prong device have to offer?  The deal is that these devices can be introduced from an incision inside the hair, the tissues are dissected over the face and the string, thread or prongs inserted under the skin.  The tissues are hooked by the device and then lifted towards the incision where it’s anchored.  OK, let’s examine each point logically.

2. Let’s say that all that I just said works perfectly (doubtful but let’s say it anyway) problem is what do you do with the loose skin.  Remember the loose skin.  Look into a mirror and pull your skin up and back…there’s a pleat of extra skin that develops along the front of your ears.  Now, with the string, thread or prong lifts, no skin is removed from in front of the ears, so where does it go?  Good question.

3. What happens if the attachments of the thread, string or pronged device gives way at one end or the other.  Remember it’s attached to tissue and tissue does rip and tear and it’s not unlikely that this could and may happen at either end of the device and at 1 or more different locations.  You may not have known but these devices (threads and strings) typically use 8-12 threads per each side of the face.  So the attachments may loosen on 2, 3 or more threads on either side of the face.  Why wouldn’t they?

4. Threads, strings and other hard devices can erode through the deeper tissues and become visible or their prongs can become visible at which point the device must be removed.

5. These devices are foreign bodies and can cause localized skin irritation or infection that may mar the face.

Most important of all is the lack of ability to tighten the underlying muscle layer, of the face, and remove the excess skin… does this make sense to you?  I know you want something that will give you resulkts without an incision but that’s just not reality with the current state of technology.  Perhaps in 10 years, we’ll be able to make an incision and manipulate the tiissue to grow new epithelium into the incision area eliminating the scar completely…some day but not today!

 Take home message.  If you have loose skin on the face look at our Celebrity Lift.

http://www.drfpalmer.com/PalmerCelebrityLift.html

Dr. Francis R Palmer, III