Preparing for the Surgery

Not long before the abdominoplasty your surgeon will give you detailed instructions on how to prepare for surgery, including directions on eating and drinking, smoking, and taking or avoiding definite vitamins, and medications.

If you smoke, you must refuse to it to two weeks before your surgery and not to restart for two weeks after your surgery. Don’t overexposure to the sun before surgery and do not go on a severe diet, as it can restrain your ability to heal. If you take a cold or infection the day before your surgery will probably be delayed.

Irrespective of your surgery is done on an outpatient or inpatient basis, you must organize for someone to drive you home after your surgery, and to help you out for a day or two after you leave the hospital, if needed.

Where the Operation Will be Performed

Many surgeons perform both partial and complete abdominoplasties in an outpatient surgical center or an office-based facility. Some prefer the hospital, because their patients can stay there for several days.

  An Anesthesia

Your doctor may select two types of anesthesia:
a) general anesthesia, when you’ll sleep through the operation.
b) local anesthesia, combined with a narcotic to make you sleepy.
The local anesthesia cause you are awake but relaxed, but your abdominal region will be not sensitive to pain. Nevertheless, you may feel some tugging or some discomfort.)

The Surgery

Whole abdominoplasty generally takes two to five hours. It depends on the amount of work required. Partial abdominoplasty can take an hour or two.

Most frequently, the surgeon will make a long cut from hipbone to hipbone above the pubic area. A second cut will be made to free the navel from nearby tissue. In partial abdominoplasty, the cut is much shorter and the navel can often not be moved. While it may be drew into a deviant shape because the skin is tightened and stitched.

Then, the surgeon detaches the skin from the abdominal wall all the way up to your ribs. He raises a large skin flap to disclose the vertical muscles in your abdomen, which are tightened by pulling them close together and stitching them into this new position. It gives a firmer abdominal wall and narrows the waistline.

Then the skin flap is stretched down. The extra skin is detached. A new hole is cut for your umbilicus, which is then stitched in place. At the end the cuts will be stitched, dressings will be applied, and a transient tube may be inserted to drain excess fluid.

In partial abdominoplasty, the skin is divided only between the incision line and the navel. Then the skin is stretched down, removing the excess skin, and the flap is stitched back into place.