With summer finally in full swing and nearby beaches, rivers, and parks filling up, men and women are trying to look their best in clothes that tend to show more than the heavy sweaters of winter.
Standard liposuction is the oldest and best-known fat removal procedure, but recently two new options have become ever more popular. Smartlipo® and CoolSculpting® produce great results for my Coeur d’Alene and Spokane-area patients.
I often hear patients talking about how brutal the liposuction procedures are that they see on television being performed by plastic surgeons under general anesthesia in the hospital operating room. Have you seen Dr. 90210?
As with many modern advances in surgery, liposuction has become a much safer, gentler, and less invasive procedure with the advent of Smartlipo laser assisted liposuction and tumescent local anesthesia. With Smartlipo my patients are experiencing excellent results, skin tightening, and shorter recovery times than the standard plastic surgery liposuction that we see on T.V. Adding a laser, tumescent anesthesia, micro cannulas, smaller incisions, and oral medications have transformed a pretty good operation into the modern day gold standard operation for body sculpting. Additionally, in some cases it has also become a very good alternative to the more invasive tummy tuck operation.
The Smartlipo procedure can take anywhere from 45 minutes to a couple of hours. Recovery time is minimal – you can go to work as early as the next day, but a few days recovery is recommended.
The best candidates for Smartlipo procedure are people with stubborn localized fat deposits who eat well and exercise regularly but still have pockets of fat that have not responded to a healthy lifestyle. They are seeking a complete long-lasting spot reduction and skin tightening for specific areas of fat and are able and willing to undergo a minimally invasive surgical procedure.
CoolSculpting, on the other hand, is a fantastic alternative to the minimally invasive liposuction procedure described above. Many of my cosmetic surgery patients from Spokane and Coeur d’ Alene are not interested in even the brief down time associated with Smartlipo, and are looking for a completely non-invasive body sculpting procedure. This is where CoolSculpting fits really well in my cosmetic surgery practice. The CoolSculpting protocol uses a non-invasive applicator which delivers precisely controlled cooling to the treatment area. The localized fat is precisely frozen protecting the surrounding tissues resulting in localized reduction of the fat layer. These treatment cycles last one hour. The procedure is very comfortable and often patients read or work on a laptop during treatment. Since no anesthetic is needed, patients can continue with their normal lifestyle the same day, with no downtime.
The best candidates for the CoolSculpting procedure are people near their ideal body weight who eat well and exercise regularly but still have pockets of fat that have not responded to a healthy lifestyle. They are seeking long-lasting spot reduction for specific areas of fat, but they are not considering a surgical procedure with its inherent expense, downtime, and potential risks.
Both Smartlipo and CoolSculpting are excellent tools for minimally and non-invasive body sculpting and have been a great help to many of my patients from the Spokane area.
Have hope! Losing stubborn inches is not as dangerous, difficult, painful, or brutal as it has been in the past. Contact us to set up a complimentary consultation to find out which procedure is best for your situation. We are proud to produce impressive body sculpting results for people throughout the Spokane area at our Coeur d’Alene office.
Now, go hit the beach!
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