A ^Retired Plastic Surgeon's Notebook

More on BELLY FAT

Seattle Plastic surgeon shows why belly fat cannot be treated with liposuction (with a little help from Oprah and Dr. Oz).

This, folks, is belly fat. It is inside the abdomen, deep to the abdominal muscles. It cannot be removed with liposuction or tummy tuck (abdominoplasty). Losing weight will make it shrink.

I saw a patient a couple of years ago who was requesting abdominal liposuction.  I did my usual body contouring evaluation and had the unenviable task of informing him that he was a really lousy candidate for liposuction or an abdominoplasty (tummy tuck).  His abdominal girth was caused by belly fat a.k.a. intrabdominal fat a.k.a. visceral fat a.k.a. beer belly fat.   The way I could determine this was to have him lay down on the exam table.  His belly did not flatten out.  See photo on the right.

The omentum from a deceased obese person vs. the omentum from a deceased slender person.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Belly fat collects in the mesentary, which is the structure that carries blood vessels to the abdominal organs, and the omentum, which is an apron like structure that hangs off the stomach.   In an obese person, they are very, very thick.  In a lean person, the mesentary and omentum are very thin and translucent.   Here is Dr. Oz holding the omentum of a fat person and Oprah holding the omentum of lean person.  There is NO WAY a fat omentum can be sucked down to a thin omentum.  The only way to reduce an omentum is to lose weight.  I referred the patient to Dr. Richard Lindquist at Swedish Medical Center Weight Loss Services.

I asked him to follow-up with me but I haven’t heard from him.  And he never went to Dr. Lindquist.  I hope he did not find a surgeon ignorant or desperate enough to do surgery on him.  If he did, my guess is that he is sorely disappointed with his result.

Thanks for reading!  Dr. Lisa Lynn Sowder

 

Category: Body Contouring, Liposuction, Obesity, Tummy Tuck | Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

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