Introduction

We are all aging. The effects of gravity and sun exposure are inevitable – they cause us all to develop an aging face.

One of the key principles of facelift and neck surgery is understanding the changes that occur as we age. Aging effects on the face are due to gravity as well as a reduction in volume in some areas and laxity of the skin in other areas. As gravity causes the suspensory ligaments of the face to stretch, the skin over the top of these ligaments can stretch. This stretching then causes an appearance of volume loss in areas of the face.

Symptoms

Classic signs of aging of the face include developing jowls, increased wrinkles over the cheek, formation of a tear trough deformity on the inner aspect of the eye and a bulge of fat below the eye. Some people go through these changes much earlier than others and unfortunately may have the appearance of being grumpy or tired all of the time.

As these signs of aging progress, patients develop wrinkles [rhytids] which can then form as thick creases over the cheeks. These wrinkles get worse over time. Associated with these wrinkles and further descent of the face patients develop worsening of their nasolabial crease – crease beside their mouth. This crease causes patients to feel like they look a lot older than they are.

To compensate for these changes some people may have fillers injected, which does even out small hollows and troughs but is not a long-term solution to the aging face.

Treatment

A deep plane facelift is the best solution to an aging face. The deep plane facelift resuspends the ligaments of the face which have become lax with age. The deep plane is one plane deeper than the skin and because of the elevation occurring in that plane patients have a far more natural appearance of their skin post-operatively. The deep plane facelift doesn’t put undue stress on the skin of the face and avoids an unnatural “pulled” look which can be associated with other methods of facelift.

Gallery

You can view before and after patient photos of Aging Face in the Facelift Gallery.

Related Information

Facelift

To discuss fixing your aging face, please make an appointment with Dr Dan Robinson.