Best Weight for Body Contouring

Body contouring is an umbrella term that refers to a whole host of cosmetic procedures. Generally speaking, body contouring removes excess skin and removes small amounts of fat to give your body more attractive contours. These are not weight-loss procedures. In fact, your plastic surgeon in Tampa will want you to be as close to your goal weight as possible before undergoing any of these procedures.

Good Candidates for Body Contouring

Body contouring procedures help people who’ve experienced a dramatic change in size or shape. Patients who have gone through pregnancy or lost a significant amount of weight tend to have extra skin afterward. This extra skin can really make their self-esteem suffer, and body contouring is used to mitigate that.

During the procedure, your board-certified plastic surgeon will remove that extra skin. They will also use liposuction to remove small amounts of fat that may be close to impossible to completely eradicate with diet and exercise alone. The general purpose of the procedure: to give you back the smooth skin and shape you had before your skin was stretched. Depending on placement, your surgeon may even be able to remove many of your stretch marks.

Best Weight for Body Contouring: The Importance of Stability

Unfortunately, it is all too common for people to put weight back on after losing a substantial amount. To protect your health and ensure that you’re ready for body contouring, your doctor will likely ask you about your lifestyle. Typically, plastic surgeons prefer to wait until a potential patient has maintained a relatively stable weight for about two years.

For women recovering from pregnancy, that wait can be reduced to about one year if they were at their target weight prior to becoming pregnant. It may seem a bit invasive and feel like a long time, but your surgeon needs to know that you’re able to maintain a relatively healthy weight. Due to the fact that body contouring can remove a substantial amount of skin, gaining a lot of weight would force your remaining skin to stretch even farther.

Put simply. Your surgeon is only asking these questions to ensure that the procedure is safe for you. They want you to keep the results you’ve earned, and helping you establish a permanently healthy lifestyle is a huge part of that.

What Areas Can Be Contoured?

Your surgeon can basically contour any area of the body where you have excess skin. Some of the most popular areas include the abdomen, upper arms, inner thighs, breasts, and buttocks. Many patients also use this opportunity to have other procedures done to help with their overall look. Breast lifts, augmentations, and neck lifts are all fairly common.

Are you interested in an additional procedure? Then your surgeon will expand their evaluation to determine if you’re in good enough health for both. They will also have to expand their discussion of possible risks and the necessary post-operative care. So don’t feel too surprised if the conversation seems a bit long.

Where to Start

If you are a good candidate for body contouring, then you may wonder where to start. Fortunately, your local board-certified plastic and reconstructive surgeon, Dr. Joseph M. Brown offers body contouring in Tampa. To get started, all you have to do is schedule a consultation. During your initial consultation, you’ll discuss your concerns and goals. With Dr. Brown’s help, you can identify the procedure(s) that are best for you.

As long as you’re honest in the evaluation of your health and follow your surgeon’s pre and post-operative instructions, then you’ll find that plastic surgery is quite safe in the hands of a board-certified plastic surgeon. After a few months of recovery, you’ll look and feel better than ever.