When people think of cosmetic plastic surgery, they often think of a facelift. The facelift could be the first true cosmetic surgery, first performed in Berlin in 1901 by Eugen Hollander. Despite non-surgical alternatives such as dermal fillers,
facelifts are still usually one of the top five cosmetic surgeries.
Gravity, sun damage (especially here in sunny Naples), and slackening support tissues create the need for a facelift to turn back the march of time just a bit. As you age, your cheeks lose volume and sag, deep creases form under your eyes and between your nose and mouth, you develop jowls, and loose skin and fat hang under your chin and jaw.
But a facelift with Dr. Turk can turn back the clock on facial aging, making a person look from 10 to 15 years younger.
What areas do facelifts target?
Clinically known as a rhytidectomy (of Greek origin meaning wrinkle + excision), a facelift rejuvenates the mid-to-lower face and neck. These are the areas Dr. Turk targets with the procedure:
- Nasolabial folds (laugh lines)
- Mid-face sagging
- Deep creases under the eyes
- Jowls
- Sagging cheeks
- Loose skin and fat under the chin and jaw
Not the full face
Despite their lengthy tenure in the plastic surgery world, there is the misperception that a facelift addresses aging on the entire face. This isn’t the case. Facelifts address the mid- and lower face. They do not rejuvenate the brows, eyelids, or nose. To address these areas, some patients combine a facelift with a brow lift or eyelid surgery. The use of dermal fillers and Botox can help with some of these areas, as well.
Also, a facelift doesn’t stop a person from naturally aging. This may seem obvious, but some patients are surprised. Your results will take a decade of more off your facial age, however.
Techniques
A traditional facelift rejuvenates the face, jowls, and neck. For this procedure, Dr. Turk makes an incision that begins in the hairline at the temples, moves down around the front of the ear, then behind the earlobe, ending in the lower scalp at the hairline. After the skin is lifted, underlying fat is sculpted or removed, muscle and tissue are repositioned, and excess skin is trimmed then re-draped.
Other techniques employed by Dr. Turk are a mid-face lift that mainly targets the cheeks and smile lines and a limited-incision facelift that targets the areas around the mouth and eyes. Both of these techniques involve only small incisions that are easily hidden.
Dr. Turk can adapt the method he uses to your particular needs for your facelift. Call him at 239-348-4357 and schedule a consultation.