Aging can make your skin lose its spark and the sprightly glow. As you age, the skin loses its elasticity and begins to sag. And it’s not just the facial skin that gets affected, your neck skin gets affected similarly. The aged skin is usually loose and hangs low, giving the appearance of lower cheeks and jowls in your neck. Moreover, the natural contours of your face and neck may be affected as well and may get covered by exaggerated, abnormal contours that add several years to your age. There are many different types of facelift and neck lift procedures to treat these common concerns.
It is important to note that these changes, although most commonly are associated with the aging process, can also occur due to the effects of stress, environmental factors like pollution, and UV exposure. Regardless of the cause, the changes in the appearance and texture of the skin can be a serious mental and physical burden.
Depending on the extent of skin changes and loss of natural contours, you may choose to undergo cosmetic surgery to rejuvenate and restore the natural appearance of your neck and face. But which procedure should you go for? Well, that depends on personal factors.
If you notice the looseness of your facial skin, but not many changes in the appearance of your neck, then you may choose to go for a face lift alone. Once you make the decision to undergo a facelift, you will have to choose from different types of facelift. This decision, once again, depends on personal factors and the amount of loose and saggy skin present.
However, if you notice the signs of aging appear on your neck without much changes to your facial skin, then you may choose to undergo a neck lift alone which can significantly improve the appearance of your neck by tightening the skin and reducing the appearance of jowls and wrinkles. Similar to the facelift procedure, the neck lift procedure also has several types that you can choose from, depending on your preferences and personal factors.
Book a consultation with Specialist Plastic Surgeon, Dr Doyle to find which surgery is the right fit for you.
A facelift procedure is a surgical procedure that is performed with the purpose of tightening the saggy skin of the face by removing excess skin and repositioning the underlying tissue. This procedure results in youthful and rejuvenated skin that is guaranteed to take several years off your age. You can undergo one of the seven different types of facelift procedures, all of which are explained in detail below;
Signs of aging first begin to appear in the lower region of your face in the form of loose skin and jowls that give the appearance of low-hanging cheeks. There may also be saggy skin that falls over the jawline, completely ruining the definition and esthetics of your jawline.
To remove the first signs of aging from your lower facial region, you can undergo a mini facelift procedure, rather than a complete facelift as the rest of your facial skin is completely fine. A mini facelift procedure is done under general anaesthesia at John Flynn Private Hospital.
For the mini facelift procedure, Dr Doyle will make incisions in front of the ear, extending from your hair down in front of the ear and up behind the ear and into the hairline to remove excess skin and enhance the natural contours of your face. The incisions are well hidden and the scars are usually difficult to see.
The mini facelift procedure is the best option for a younger age group that is suffering from early signs of aging, stress, and UV exposure. Older age groups can also undergo this procedure if only the lower part of the face is affected by aging. Book a consultation with Dr Doyle now to assess if this is the best procedure for you.
Full and high-raised cheeks are a vital sign of your youth and as you age, these full cheeks begin to sag and give a fatty and saggy mid-facial appearance. This can result in a sunken eye appearance that is bound to make you look tired and dull. Moreover, the sagginess of the cheeks exaggerates the nasolabial folds or the lines starting from your nose going down to the corners of your lips. These deep nasolabial folds further enhance the saggy and droopy appearance of your cheek, which can make you look significantly older than you really are.
A mid-facelift procedure improves the appearance of your cheeks and eyes, hence giving you a youthful and glowing appearance. For this procedure, Dr Doyle will make the incisions around your hairline and forehead to tighten and raise your cheeks, hence removing the dull sunken eye appearance and defining your cheek structure.
This procedure is a good option for those who suffer from saggy cheeks but no sagginess of the skin in the neck or chin region.
A Deep Plane Facelift is a surgical procedure that involves deep dissection into the facial tissues in order to lift the loose facial and neck skin. As a result of the deeper dissection the procedure has a much higher risk of complications without a significant improvement in results compared with the SMAS lift – See below. For this reason, Dr Doyle does not perform this procedure.
Another important facial region that gets affected by aging is your forehead. Fine lines, wrinkles, and sagging of skin that can result in droopy eyelids are some of the main signs that your brows need attention. To improve the appearance of your upper face or the forehead and eyebrows, you can undergo a brow lift procedure. Dr Doyle does this procedure using an endoscope (a small telescope).
This procedure begins with incisions in your scalp and the endoscope is passed through these incisions under the forehead skin down to the level of the brows. This allows Dr Doyle to work on the eyebrows without using scars on the forehead. The brows are released and the skin of your forehead is lifted and tightened. This results in a smoother forehead, eyebrows in a normal position and apparent less loose skin in the upper eyelids. This procedure is often combined with upper blepharoplasties to remove any remaining loose upper eyelid skin.
This procedure may be right for you if you are bothered by the appearance of your upper face only. You can also opt for anti-wrinkle injections along with this procedure to further enhance the smooth and youthful results.
If you are just beginning to see wrinkles and fine lines on your forehead with minimal drooping of your eyebrows and want to solve this problem before it worsens, you can undergo a relatively less invasive, temporal brow lift procedure. For this procedure, the incisions will be made in your hairline, along the side of your head. The purpose of making incisions there is to diagonally tighten the skin of your forehead, temple, and eyebrows.
This procedure is the procedure of choice for you if you want to remove the effects of aging as soon as they appear and don’t want to undergo an invasive full brow lift procedure. Book a consultation now to find out which of the two is the best choice for you.
If your entire face is showing signs of aging in the form of droopy eyelids and saggy cheeks along with wrinkles and fine lines on your entire face, you may benefit from a traditional facelift. This procedure treats the lower 2/3rds of the face. A traditional or lower facelift procedure includes tightening of the skin along with a significant SMAS lift to help reverse the effects of the aging process. The SMAS (Superficial Muscular Aponeurotic System) is an area of the musculature of the face that when tightened can provide a long-lasting elevation of the face. This is Dr Doyle’s preferred procedure for facial rejuvenation. It is not only your facial appearance that improves, your neck contours will be enhanced too by this procedure resulting in an overall youthful appearance of your face and neck.
For a SMAS facelift procedure, Dr Doyle will make incisions in front of the ear, extending from your hair down in front of the ear and up behind the ear and into the hairline to remove excess skin and enhance the natural contours of your face. Excess skin and fat are removed from the face and neck, underlying muscle tissue is tightened and lifted and repositioned to define the facial structures and the neckline. This results in significant improvement in the appearance of your face and neck.
It is important to note that this procedure should only be considered if there are moderate to significant signs of aging. Book a consultation with Dr Doyle to find out if you would benefit from this procedure.
See All Facelift Before and After Images
The effects of aging and stress, along with environmental toxins, can sometimes initially develop in the neck region and ruin your neckline without affecting the facial skin and overall aesthetics. In that case, you can choose to undergo a neck lift procedure rather than a facelift procedure. As well as there are many different types of facelift procedures, there are also many different types of neck lift procedures. When choosing to undergo a neck lift procedure, you can choose from four different surgical options depending on personal factors and expectations from the procedure.
Aging can make your neck skin lose its elasticity and appear saggy. This can make you look older than your age and alter the definition of your jawline.
To rid yourself of these effects, you can choose to undergo a traditional neck lift procedure. This procedure uses incisions that are made behind your ears, extending upwards then horizontally across to run down your hairline. In some circumstances, a small scar is also made around the ear lobe to tighten the jowls if necessary. The traditional neck lift procedure is performed with the purpose of improving the appearance of the neck and jawline to remove years from your physical appearance.
Additional incisions may be made underneath your chin to enhance the results of this procedure. Liposuction of your chin region may be done during the procedure for the same reason. This procedure is a good choice for you if you are suffering from saggy skin of the neck that has added several years to your appearance.
A limited neck lift procedure is performed in a similar fashion to the traditional neck lift procedure except that the incisions are only made along your hairline, and no liposuction is done during this procedure. This procedure is mainly performed with the purpose of defining your neck contours that have minimal signs of aging present. As the name suggests, this procedure is a limited or minimally invasive procedure with limited results. It is not appropriate to opt for this procedure if you suffer from significant sagging of your neck skin.
Book a consultation with Dr Doyle to find out which different types of neck lift would best benefit you.
The platysma muscles of your neck are the muscles that create vertical bands of muscle in your neck which can be unsightly. For this procedure, a small incision is made underneath your chin to remove excess fat from the neck and jawline which is responsible for jowls in the neck. After that, the platysma bands are treated in several ways to improve the definition of your neck and jawline.
This procedure is the right choice for you if you only suffer from prominent muscular bands in the neck. This technique does not remove or tighten loose skin in the neck. It is commonly performed in combination with a traditional neck lift in those patients who also have excess sagging and drooping of the skin.
If the effects of aging have become visible on your face and neck skin to the point that it has become a psychological and physical burden, then you should book a consultation now to see which of the different types of facelift and neck lift procedures may be the solution to your problems. If there are other problem areas that you would like to fix, you can undergo the above-mentioned procedures along with different associated procedures like eyelid surgery to ensure that you achieve the results you desire.
Dr Mark Doyle is a fully qualified Specialist Plastic Surgeon with over 30 years of experience performing breast, body, face and nose surgery. He has completed all required training and only carries out approved surgical practices. There are NO undertrained doctors or cosmetic doctors acting as surgeons at Gold Coast Plastic Surgery.