FACELIFTS – RHYTIDECTOMY
Dr. Berlet has been in practice as a New Jersey plastic surgeon for over 20 years in Essex County, Bergen County, and the surrounding areas and has developed a large clientele from around the country and abroad.
New Jersey Facelift (Rhytidectomy)
All faces age some more than others depending on their exposure to sun, gravity, underlying genetic disposition and certainly time. A facelift is an option to correct the lower half of your face from the level of your eyes down to your neck. It counteracts this aging process by tightening muscle, removing fat below the neck, and trimming excess skin giving your face a fresher, rested, youthful look. It can reverse the aging process anywhere from 10-20 years. The technical name for a facelift is a rhytidectomy which literally means removal of wrinkles. It is most effective for people who have sagging of the mid-face resulting in jowls and sagging areas of fat with loose skin and fat under the neck and jaw. A facelift is excellent at correcting jowls, the laxity of the neck, and reestablishing a pristine jawline. Facelifts are often done in conjunction with eyelid surgery, brow lifts, fillers and fat injection. Some patients may even opt for skin resurfacing for extensively sun-damaged skin following the facelift.
HOW IS A FACELIFT PERFORMED?
Traditionally, most surgeons have designed a facelift to fight the effects of gravity by creating a sling from your cheekbone to cheekbone as well as suturing under the neck. Unfortunately the natural aging process is not a downward gravity effect but rather a laxity of the muscles from chewing and speaking which results in a rotation of the cheek down and rotation of the neck out. To correct these, it is best to rotate the face back into its optimal position and rotate the neck back. This effectively creates a natural appearing jawline and accentuates the jawline and gets rid of the squareness that comes with aging. The procedure has evolved to one which can be performed under local anesthesia with an oral sedative. Following the procedure, the patients go home without bandages, without drains, and can shower the next morning. The recovery typically is 1-2 weeks to be comfortably in public depending on your hairstyle. A facelift will typically last 7-10 years, however, you will always have an improved appearance than if you had never had a facelift. The risks include bleeding, infection, bruising, uneven swelling or discoloration, possible skin blistering usually in smokers, and temporary loss of sensation in the face which usually returns within several months.
Click here to view our gallery of before and after New Jersey facelift images.
Click here for more information on our New Jersey facelift services in Essex County, Bergen County, Cedar Grove and surrounding areas.
