The past 5 years or so has seen a huge increase in the number of patients having surgical procedures that utilize their own fat to correct a cosmetic deformity or improve their appearance.

Popular procedures such as the Brazillian Butt lift or breast augmentation with fat have really taken off.

One of the reasons for this increased popularity is the improvement in harvesting techniques and newer technologies that allow for greater survival of the injected fat.

Let’s be clear fat grafting or fat injections is a major procedure. It is major surgery and involves liposuction to collect the fat- and then processing the fat to remove the impurities and injection into the desired areas.

It is not a simple procedure and involves some downtime and some degree of discomfort.

In the past, plastic surgeons frowned upon fat grafting, or Brazilian Butt Lift, because success rates were low and results variable. With more research and experience, we are now able to use your own fat more predictably and in a safer fashion

The Brazillian Butt Lift, for example, was popularized in Brazil were the buttocks appearance has a high priority in the aesthetic ideal. Our country has caught on and there is an increasing demand.

In this procedure, it is as important where you remove the fat as where you inject it. The buttock shape is a combination of a shapely waist , thigh and abdomen with the correct volume improvement in the buttock.

This is a complicated procedure,  not something to be taken lightly.

The recovery can be hard because to allow the fat to live, you have to avoid pressure on the buttock. This means avoidance of sitting on hard surfaces for at least 2 weeks.

Success is dependent on proper management of the donor site (areas that are liposuctioned) as well as protection of the grafted or injected sites.

Results are generally good but revisions are often necessary as the injected fat does not always survive. Nonetheless, it is a great procedure and always improves the buttock appearance