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If you want to get rid of saggy and loose skin, body contouring can be an effective treatment. It can help you get rid of extra fat, shape areas of your body and even tighten loose skin.
It can be done surgically by using options like lifts and liposuctions or can be done using heat, cold, laser or other nonsurgical methods. Among the two, the surgical method has more risks but usually offers more noticeable results.
What is body contouring?
Body contouring, also called body sculpting, is a process that helps eliminate fat and shapes areas of the body while also tightening the skin.
It's a surgical or medical technique that helps reshape a particular area of the body and involves certain procedures that do the following:
- eliminates extra skin
- get rid of excess fat
- reshape or sculpt the particular area
Body sculpting can target most areas of the body, but some common sites for the procedure include the back, arms, belly, thighs, love handles, chin and neck.
An important point to note here is that body contouring does not help in losing weight. Instead, it reshapes the body and targets specific areas where the skin has become saggy and loose as a result of weight loss. Moreover, it can also work in areas where weight loss isn’t that effective.
What is a surgical body contouring?
Surgical body sculpting involves reshaping specific areas of the body by using surgical methods. Major options for the surgical procedure include:
Liposuction: It suctions out fat accumulation.
Lifts and tucks: These surgical processes eliminate extra skin and fat and involve procedures like facelift (rhytidectomy), tummy tuck (abdominoplasty), breast lift and (mastopexy).
What to expect during surgical body contouring?
A surgical body contouring lasts 45 minutes or more depending on what type of surgery you are having. Most of the surgeries involve:
- marking the areas that need to be operated
- giving anesthesia
- cleaning and preparing the skin
- making cuts
- repositioning and eliminating fats
- trimming extra skin
- suctioning out fat using liposuction or with other procedures
- closing the incisions
- applying bandages
What is non-surgical body contouring?
Non-surgical body contouring, also referred to as non-surgical fat reduction, involves a variety of procedures. These methods eliminate or reduce fat to sculpt different areas of the body.
Most of the non-surgical body sculpting processes involve the following:
Laser lipolysis: It uses laser energy and controlled heating to target the fat cells.
Cryolipolysis or CoolSculpting: This procedure involves using freezing temperature to target and eliminate specific fat cells.
Contour light therapy: It involves using a combination of infrared light and mid-600 nm via a high-powered microchip LED. It is applied via a flexible and soft pad that's placed on a specific part of the body.
Radiofrequency lipolysis: This method uses controlled ultrasound technology and heating to eliminate fat cells.
Injection lipolysis: During this method, injections of deoxycholic acid are given to target a particular area of the body.
What to expect during non-surgical body contouring?
One session of non-surgical body sculpting takes about 30 minutes to an hour. Most of the sessions involve:
- marking the skin with a marker or pen
- using a tool like a wand or paddles to provide cold or heat, ultrasound waves or laser beams, depending on the type of non-surgical sculpting method you are having.
What are the benefits of body sculpting?
Body sculpting can provide a plethora of benefits. It can result in well-defined and well-shaped body parts and also improve overall body appearance. Moreover, it can help smoothen skin texture and provide a symptomatic improvement.
While results from surgical body sculpting methods are more immediate and noticeable, with non-invasive methods, it may take a few weeks or even months to notice differences.
What are the risks associated with body sculpting?
Surgical and non-surgical contouring methods both involve certain risks and complications, though relatively uncommon. With surgical methods, risks can include:
- blood clots
- bleeding
- asymmetry
- damages to the muscles, organs, blood vessels and nerves
- trouble waking up because of anesthesia
- hematoma
- infection
- injury to the nerves
- numbness or loss of sensation
- swelling or pain
- scarring
- skin discoloration
With non-surgical methods, risks are less, but they occur. These include:
- redness
- rashes
- hives
- swelling
- soreness or pain
- blood clots due to injections
Recovery
When it comes to recovery, any surgical procedure can take weeks or even months to recover completely, but that also depends on incisions and the type of surgery you had.
For non-surgical methods, recovery times are much shorter, and sometimes, people get back to their work immediately after the procedure.
