Body lift – How to reduce risks

The Body lift is a procedure which lifts and tightens the entire lower part of the body. The procedure is actually three separate procedures performed in the same operative session. The component parts of the Body lift are the tummy tuck, the outer thigh lift and excisional butt lift.

operating room time for Body lift procedure is 7-8 hours

The average amount of operating room time required for the Lower body lift procedure is 7-8 hours . This procedure can be performed under General Anesthesia or IV sedation.

With the procedure taking so long, it is normal to ask yourself these questions: ‘How can risks be reduced with a Body lift?”, and “Can the choice of anesthesia reduce the risks?”

1-Anesthesia choice is the biggest risk with a body lift

Surgery has a variety of risks, but the choice of anesthesia for the Body lift is one of the big ones . You can definitely reduce the risk of pulmonary embolism or blood clot to the lungs by choosing IV Anesthesia with propofol instead of General Anesthesia.

With long procedures, 5-7% of patients develop pulmonary embolism with the use of General Anesthesia.

Many surgeons use General Anesthesia, but there are very serious risks for blood clots or pulmonary embolisms for the body lift. These anesthesia related complications occur more frequently for procedures longer than 4 hours.

Since the body lift typically takes 6-8 hours, there are high risks. With long procedures, 5-7% of patients develop pulmonary embolism with the use of General Anesthesia. The choice of IV anesthesia with propofol instead of General Anesthesia is one easy way to reduce that risk.

Lower body lift with IV sedation with propofol

I perform all of my Lower body lifts as an out-patient procedure at our Quad A accredited surgical center under IV sedation with propofol. Most of my patients have a surgery duration time of 7-8 hours. Even though the surgery is so long, the use of IV anesthesia is less taxing on the body.

I have performed hundreds of Body lifts, and there is not a single patient who needed hospitalization overnight.

All of my Body lift patients are discharged to go home the same day. I have performed hundreds of Body lifts, and there is not a single patient who needed hospitalization overnight.

The use of IV anesthesia instead of General Anesthesia also offers the bonus that you wake up much faster and have little nauses. But, most importantly, all patients have a lower risk for pulmonary embolism because I use IV sedation.

What makes IV sedation safer than general anesthesia for body lifts?

With IV sedation there is extremely low risk (less than .5% risk compared to > 7%) of a blood clot to the lungs.

Furthermore, the anesthetic used in IV sedation is cleared from the system very quickly, so there is very little hangover from the anesthetic. Patients are asleep enough not to remember anything, but light enough to wake from anesthesia quickly.

With IV sedation there is extremely low risk of a blood clot to the lungs.

With IV anesthesia, you do not need a ventilator to breath. With IV anesthesia you do not have a tube through your nose and you are breathing on your own. Since you breathing without a ventilator (General Anesthesia), all the risks of that process are removed.

Even since the advent of Covid, most patients now understand how risky ventilators can be! With IV sedation, with no ventilator in use, patients do not have any risks associated with the intubation process. Nor do they have the after affects of the fixation of the tube in your nose and throat.

2-Use of tumescent solution during the Body lift procedure

Another way to reduce risks during the Body lift is for your surgeon to use tumescent solution to restrict blood loss. This is the anesthetic which is injected near the surgical site, much like how a dentist numbs an area. Tumescent anesthesia has effective amounts of local short and long acting anesthetics diluted in large volumes of fluid.

The combination of the two types of anesthesia (tumescent + IV sedation) allows the surgeon to do a lot of surgery without having the patient under General Anesthesia. More importantly, the patient emerges from anesthesia with very little pain.

Because of the tumescent local anesthesia, there is very little need for narcotics. Narcotics can cause a lot of nausea after surgery, constipation, and can depress the patient’s respirations. Avoiding narcotics during and after surgery is a big part of our strategy.

3-Choice of surgical technique for wound closure

There are various ways that a surgeon can dissect the abdomen area, and make his/her wound closure. My preferred method is the Lockwood technique.

This technique sutures tightly at the deeper layers, so there is not so much tension at the top layer of the skin. This reduces many risks such as hematoma and seroma. I have written about this technique here.

4-Pain pumps or exparel post operatively to reduce pain

We use a pain pump that pumps local anesthetics into the abdominal muscles. Alternatively we use Exparel injection. They work the same way. This is very important because as the patient emerges from anesthesia, they breathe more easily with less pain.

Since they are typically not hungover from anesthesia, they are alert and talking within a few minutes of waking up. This is a far cry from when I used to use General Anesthesia in the hospital, when patients were so hungover from anesthesia I felt reluctant to discharge them from the hospital.

Risks for the Body lift can be easily reduced!

All of these things make our Body lift approach very safe and reliable as an outpatient procedure. But the real payoff comes during the recovery period. As a matter of fact, the level of comfort is such, we find ourselves warning patients not to do too much!

I love doing Body lifts and I feel very confident that by using IV anesthesia I am offering a safer solution to giving patients their desired results.

(originally posted 2/22/2009)