Liposuction has come a long way in the 40 or so years it has been available. When it first came out, it was basically the use of a hollow metal rod attached to a suction system, in what was called “dry lipo.” According to Dr. John Mancoll at Mancoll Cosmetic and Plastic Surgery in Virginia Beach, the original procedure was rather aggressive and messy. So, over the years, people have looked at different ways to improve the process and make it safe and “more predictable.”
Today there are a variety of different types of “liposuction” procedures to help remove stubborn fat deposits with less pain and better outcomes. “One of the restrictions or drawbacks of liposuction is that it’s great for removing fat, but you don’t always get a lot of skin tightening,” says Dr. Mancoll. “But now that I have what is called Smartlipo™, which is a laser-assisted liposuction, as well as VASERlipo™, which is ultra-sound assisted lipo, those energies can be taken up by the skin to stimulate tightening. With traditional lipo, it is generally believed you can get about a 5 percent skin retraction. With these new energy-assisted lipos, you can see more like 25 percent. So you can get some pretty impressive changes without having to do a tummy tuck or cut away the extra skin.
All of the options at Mancoll Cosmetic and Plastic Surgery, including CoolScuplting®, which is a non-invasive procedure that freezes fat and lets it flush from your body naturally, have a specific function to provide fat removal and body sculpting. “I tell my patients that I don’t go out on a golf course with a single club and expect it to work with every shot,” explains Dr. Mancoll. “The same is true for liposuction. I have all of these different tools available to take care of different problem areas.”
Before going anywhere for a liposuction procedure, Dr. Mancoll encourages people to do a little research first so they know more about the facility that will be performing the task. “If you go to a plastic surgeon who is certified by the American Board of Plastic Surgery, you can be assured they have gone through not necessarily a few years of training, but in some cases a decade or more,” he says. “You can’t go to a weekend course and expect to teach what it would otherwise take years to pass on, but unfortunately those places do exist, and they are not necessarily cheap. So people really need to know their doctor and the reputation of the place where they are going to get their treatment. And that’s very easy to find on the Internet. There are a lot of choices out there, and they don’t have to settle for anything that doesn’t seem right to them.”
