53 year old female patient after she had high definition liposuction of her abdomen, back, flanks, arms, and medial thighs – Left Oblique View
Introduction: What does ex-vivo liposuction mean for a plus-sized client?
Ex-vivo liposuction has changed the body contouring possibilities for plus-sized clients. Previously, plastic surgeons did not consider patients with a BMI of 25 or greater candidates for high definition body contouring. Plus-sized clients present with moderate to severe excess fat, as well as moderate to severe skin redundancy. These two factors can significantly hinder a surgeons ability to produce high definition results. Today, it has given body sculptors the ability to safely and effectively contour a plus-sized client’s body. There are several advantages for plus-sized clients undergoing ex-vivo liposuction.
What is ex-vivo liposuction?
Plus-sized patients often require an excision in the form of a tummy tuck, lateral thigh tuck, and buttock tuck, upper body lift, or lower body lift. As a result of the excision, there are skin flaps that have been removed from the patient’s body. Those skin flaps still have harvestable fat on them. Ex-vivo liposuction allows your SurgiSculpt surgeon to liposuction the fat out of these skin flaps on the table, rather than on the patient.
The ability to perform this procedure for the plus-sized patient offers several advantages. First, being able to perform ex-vivo liposuction reduces the operative time. A patient’s excision can be sutured and sealed while liposuction is being performed on the excised skin. Reducing operative times increases the safety of the procedure for a plus-sized client. Additionally, liposuction can be performed more aggressively on the skin flap since there is no risk of mechanical damage to the actual patient’s body. the act of liposuction inevitably results in blood loss. Being able to liposuction tissues without active blood flow since it has been removed from the body will prevent significant blood loss.
Ex-vivo liposuction harvests cleaner fat and increases harvest volumes
Second, ex-vivo liposuction harvests cleaner fat. Since the fat is being harvested from a flap of skin that is no longer connected to the patient’s body there is no active blood flow through the tissue. As a result, there are fewer blood products in the fat harvested. This is beneficial when thinking about fat grafting and fat viability. Cleaner fat is far more likely to survive the fat grafting process. This means more than 95% of the fat will survive procedures such as a BBL or fat transfer to the breasts. Another advantage this procedure provides for the plus-sized patient is liposuction volume. In California, liposuction is limited to 5L. However, while performing ex-vivo liposuction, harvesting upwards of 9-10L of fat is possible. This fat can then be used to contour the plus-sized client’s buttocks, breasts, or any other desired area.
Conclusion: What does ex-vivo liposuction mean for a plus-sized client?
In summary, ex-vivo liposuction for the plus-sized client offers several advantages. Safety is a big consideration for plus-sized clients. Ex-vivo liposuction increases the safety of body contouring procedures by avoiding unnecessary blood loss associated with liposuction. The second manner in which it improves safety of body contouring is that it saves in operative times. Finally, ex-vivo liposuction allows for both improved quality and harvest volumes when compared to traditional techniques.
