Why Is Liposuction Growing In Popularity Among Men?

When most people think of cosmetic surgery, they think of it as a woman's arena. To a certain extent, this is true. Women do make up a majority of cosmetic surgery patients, and some surgeries (such as breast augmentation) are fairly exclusively only meant for women.  Studies have found that although women tend to get minimally invasive treatments like Botox, men are more likely to get surgical procedures.

However, there are signs that more and more men are becoming interested in getting cosmetic surgeries. Although men still are a minority among cosmetic surgery patients, their numbers are climbing. Recent polls and surveys also suggest that men are becoming more accepting of the idea of getting cosmetic surgery. In fact, in some recent surveys, the number of men who said they would consider undergoing such a surgery was greater than the number of women.

The overall number of plastic surgeries in the U.S. has been rising steadily in the past decade, about 5 percent, but new data shows that the number of men getting facelifts is up 14 percent, liposuction 7 percent and breast reductions 6 percent. In total, 1.1 million cosmetic procedures in 2010 were men.

One of the most popular cosmetic surgeries among men is liposuction (also known as lipoplasty and suction lipectomy). The name of this surgery literally means the suction of fat, and it is a procedure in which excess fat is suctioned out of the body. It is usually performed on just one or perhaps a few target areas at a time. The surgery is usually performed under local anesthesia.

During the surgery, a doctor makes one or more small incisions over the patient's target area. Then, the surgeon inserts a small surgical instrument known as a cannula into the incision. A cannula is a thin, hollow rod which can be attached to a suction device. As the surgeon moves the cannula back and forth through the fatty tissue, it breaks up and suctions out the unwanted, excess fat.

Among men, the most popular target area is the abdomen and love handles. Men tend to store a large amount of their excess fat around these areas, so it's no surprise that these are popular target areas among men. Both the front and the sides of the abdomen as well as the love handles are popular areas for treatment. Removing fat from these areas can help to reduce the problems of "beer bellies" and "love handles."

Another popular target area for men is the chest. Although there are actually a large number of men who store excess fat around their chests, many men are embarrassed to have too much fat there. This problem is frequently referred to as "man boobs," because the extra fat can make a man's chest resemble a woman's breasts. Lipoplasty can frequently help to reduce the size of man boobs by removing the excess fat.

If you are a man and would like to know whether liposculpture could help you, please contact Pacific Cielo Surgery Center at 858-756-5678.