Blog posts in category "Blepharoplasty"
How Do You Get Rid of Dark Circles Under the Eyes?
Oct
Dark circles under your eyes may be due to a tendency to have darker skin, excess fat deposits under the lower eyelid, or several other factors. There are some non-surgical as well as surgical ways to remove these circles.
Getting more sleep should help with your dark circles under your eyes. You may need to catch up for several nights before the dark circles improve.
Excellent hydration also helps with eliminating or helping dark circles under the eyes. Some people think that dehydration in general causes dark circles, and other think that abnormal fat deposits may cause dark circles under the eyes. Regardless of the cause, well hydrated lower eyelid skin may help with your lower eyelid skin tone.
Tightening the skin naturally, such as with cucumbers or other health spa products, may also help with your overall skin tone, helping to eliminate your dark circles.
Excellent skin care, including vitamin C products, medical grade eye creams, and Retin-A may help tighten your skin more than just over-the-counter products. One of my favorite medical grade products is Elastiderm, made by Obagi. All of these products will improve your lower eyelid skin color and tone, and help to reduce dark circles under the eyes.
An injection of a dermal filler, such as Juvederm XC, may plump up and fill the soft tissue around the dark circle, helping to make it less noticeable. You will probably need only 1 syringe for both eyes, and you may even have some left over for other areas of your face. However, a dermal filler injection will not necessarily completely eliminate a dark circle.
The most complete and lasting option to eliminate a dark circle under the eye is surgery, or a lower eyelid lift. This allows your eyelid fat to be removed and repositioned. If you need a filler agent, then your own fat or other agent can be placed. Your eyelid skin can be lift, tightened, and repositioned. However, the downside is that this is a true surgical procedure, with the associated surgical risks and recovery needed after wards.
Should you desire more information about my available services, or want to schedule an appointment, please contact my Patient Care Coordinator at info@drkim.com, or call our office at 415-362-1846.
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What is the Recovery Process Like After an Eyelid Lift?
Sep
An Eyelid Lift usually tightens the skin and removes some fat from the upper and lower eyelid. Occasionally, the tarsus of the lower eyelid is tightened. (The tarsus is thick, white tissue, which is where. the eyelashes originate from.)
When you get an eyelid lift, the skin of the upper and lower eyelid is surgically incised. Some of it is removed. While the incision is open, a small amount of fat may be removed as well, which helps with treating the bags underneath your eyes. The excess skin is trimmed, and the incisions are closed.
An eyelid lift typically does not hurt very much. Most patients seem to need strong pain medicine for only 1-2 days, and many patients may need only over-the-counter pain medication, even right after surgery. Since only skin and fat are surgically removed, there is not much pain associated with an eyelid lift. Even tightening the tarsus does not generate much pain after surgery.
The bark of an eyelid lift is worse than it’s bite. After an eyelid lift, you may have bruising and swelling out of proportion to the amount of surgery you had. This occurs because the eyelid skin is very thin, and is sensitive to even small amounts of surgery. Swelling and bruising usually takes several days to go away, but it depends on your overall health and other operations you may have at the same time. You will have more swelling with and upper AND lower eyelid lift. Icing, head elevation, anti-inflammatory medicine, and rest all help to reduce pain and swelling after your procedure.
Should you desire more information about my available services, or want to schedule an appointment, please contact my Patient Care Coordinator at info@drkim.com, or call our office at 415-362-1846.
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What Kind of Anesthesia is Used During an Eyelid Lift?
Aug
Local with sedation anesthesia is the usual standard for eyelid lift surgery. Sedation is given through an IV, which makes you sleepy and forgetful. The sedation medicine usually takes seconds or minutes to work. After you feel drowsy, you will then be given local anesthesia, which is injected into your eyelid skin, causing numbing of the skin.
Technically you can have an eyelid lift with just local anesthesia. I could just give you numbing medicine into your upper or lower eyelid skin, or both, wait a couple of minutes, and then perform an eyelid lift. Just using local anesthesia tends to cause some anxiety, since you are wide awake. I can assure you that you won't feel anything, but it still may generate some nervousness. Since I want to ensure that you are calm, relaxed, and not moving doing your procedure, sedation is a wonderful tool to make sure that you're calm.
In the OR/ operating room, you will probably have monitoring equipment attached. These devices will measure your oxygen levels, heart rate, and blood pressure. This is done to make sure that you are comfortable, but not too sleepy, and that you're breathing on your own.
The amount of drowsiness is adjustable, so that you can feel drowsy to completely asleep.
Should you desire more information about my available services, or want to schedule an appointment, please contact my Patient Care Coordinator at info@drkim.com, or call our office at 415-362-1846.
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How Much Does an Eyelid Lift Hurt?
Jul
An eyelid lift does not hurt that much.
An eyelid lift, or blepharoplasty, can be done on the upper eyelids, lower eyelids, or both. The eyelid lift can tighten loose skin, remove excess fat pockets, and give you a more rejuvenated look. It is usually done under light to heavy sedation anesthesia, which can be given by mouth or through an IV.
Since only skin and some fat is usually tightened, an eyelid lift usually does not hurt that much. Aectaminophen, aka Tylenol, is usually sufficient for pain control. You may need something stronger right after surgery, but within a couple of days, you should be able to stop taking narcotics and other strong pain medications.
An eyelid lift may cause a fair amount of swelling or bruising out of proportion to the actual amount of surgery. Since eyelid skin is very thin and delicate, you may develop bruising and swelling around your eyes. Friends and family who do not know you had surgery may think that someone hit you in both eyes! However, the pain immediately after a blepharoplasty is generally not that great, and many people can go back to work from home very quickly.
If you have a job that requires you to be in the public eye, such as in advertising, PR, or television, you may need a longer time to recover. You will be able to use a computer and talk on the phone within days of your procedure, but it may take a week or so for you to have little or no bruising, and be able to be presentable to clients again.
Should you desire more information about my available services, or want to schedule an appointment, please contact my Patient Care Coordinator at info@drkim.com, or call our office at 415-362-1846.
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What is the Best Age to get an Eyelid Lift?
Jul
There is no perfect age for an eyelid lift. You are a candidate for an eyelid lift if you have loose skin, or need to have your upper or lower eyelid appear more rejuvenated. Bags under the eyes are also an indication for eyelid lift surgery, and this can occur at any age.
A very common reason to consider an eyelid lift is loose, saggy skin. This occurs to aging and sun damage. You may have loose skin of the upper or lower eyelids, or both. Some ethnic groups, especially Asians, may have naturally a slight excess of skin in the upper eyelids. To tighten this loose skin, a surgical incision can be placed in the upper eyelid fold or under the eyelash line of the lower eyelid, or both, to trim the loose skin and tighten the remaining loose skin.
Having bags under the lower eye is a more common among younger patients who want an eyelid lift. Bags under the eyelids are due to pseudo herniation, or not enough skin and muscle tightness, of the lower eyelid fat pockets. These very small fat pockets, or loose lower eyelid muscle and skin, or a combination of these factors, gives you a tired appearance. This may result in bags and dark circles under your eyes.
Skin creams, skin care, and even laser treatment may not be enough to eliminate these eyelid bags and dark circles. Even if your lower eyelid skin is substantially tighter, you may still have the loose bags and dark circles under your eyes, because these treatments can't address muscle tightening or excision of the small amounts of fat. To fix those areas, you may need surgery.
To remove just the small fat deposits, you may need a surgical approach from inside the lower eyelid, also known as the conjunctiva or the pink portion of the eyelid. These fat deposits can also be removed from the outside, through an incision underneath your lower eyelash line.
To remove a portion of the muscle that's loose, or to tighten the muscle and other eyelid structures underneath the skin, you will probably need a surgical incision from the outside of the eye, under the lower eyelid eyelash area.
So, it doesn't matter what age you are- if you have loose skin, saggy appearing eyes, of dark bags under your eyes, you may be a candidate for eyelid lift surgery.
Should you desire more information about my available services, or want to schedule an appointment, please contact my Patient Care Coordinator at info@drkim.com, or call our office at 415-362-1846.
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What is the One Thing You Have to Tell Your Doctor Before Getting an Eyelid Lift?
Jun
Short Answer-
DRY EYES!
Long Explanation-
If you have dry eyes before your eyelid lift surgery, then you may continue to have dry eyes that remain the same or may actually get worse after your eyelid surgery.
Dry eyes is a common symptom in older patients- the exact type of patient who considers eyelid lift surgery. Right after your operation, because the loose eyelid skin is tightened, your eyeball, or globe, will be even more exposed to the air than usual. This contributes to dry eyes immediately after surgery.
Usually, it takes years for your eyelid skin to slowly loosen and form hooding. This actually helps your eyeballs to retain moisture. Since surgery is fairly fast in comparison to developing loose skin, your eyes may have immediate low-grade irritation and worsening symptoms of dry eyes right after your eyelid lift procedure.
However, if you're prone to dry eyes even with loose eyelid skin covering your eyeball, you may just naturally lack enough tear production to keep your eyeballs moist. You may need a Schirmer's test, which is a special eye test that measures tear production. If you have naturally dry eyes, and get an eyelid lift, you may end up with even more irritation from dry eyes and lack of tear production that is actually worse than before surgery.
There is a solution if you persist in having dry eyes- Restasis, a prescription medicine that combats dry eyes. However, it is much better to know ahead of any eyelid lift surgery that you have dry eyes, because there may be other non-surgical options or eyelid lift modifications to avoid having worsening dry eyes long-term.
Should you desire more information about my available services, or want to schedule an appointment, please contact my Patient Care Coordinator at info@drkim.com, or call our office at 415-362-1846.
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For more information on a Schirmer's test, please go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schirmer%27s_test.
For more information on Restasis, please go to www.restasis.com.
Are There Scars After an Eyelid Lift?
Jun
Yes, there are scars after an eyelid lift. However, they are very difficult to see.
Loose Eyelid Skin-Any Non-Surgical Options?
May
If you want to tighten the loose skin of your upper or lower eyelids, you have non-surgical and surgical options.
