About syringe liposuction | What and why

I could also have gone for a title called ‘why am I fond of syringe liposuction?’. Liposuction is a technique in cosmetic surgery for removing fat cells from certain parts of the body. The fat cells amenable to liposuction are between the skin and muscles. We do not perform liposuction on fat deeper than the muscles. Liposuction may be part of another procedure like abdominoplasty or gynecomastia correction. 


Liposuction involves the creation of a vacuum. This vacuum helps remove fat cells with small cannulas. Such cannulas are called liposuction cannulas. Cannulas vary depending on their diameter, length, and shape of openings near the end. We use different types of cannulas based on the area treated.  


During liposuction, a vacuum is obtained by a machine or a syringe. Syringe liposuction employs a syringe for generating liposuction. A cannula is attached to one end of the syringe. After insertion of the cannula inside the body, the surgeon pulls back the piston and locks it in place. The vacuum created inside the syringe helps move the fat cells into the syringe during to and fro movement. Once the syringe gets filled, the cannula is disconnected and the fat is emptied. The same process gets repeated till the desired endpoint is reached. This constitutes syringe liposuction. 


Syringe liposuction is a simple technique with a lot of benefits. This makes it popular among many practitioners. Some of the benefits include the following, 

1. Precision. Syringe liposuction enables the exact measurement of the aspirated fat. This helps correlate fat aspirated from both sides of the body. In the case of pre-existing asymmetry, the aspirate can be adjusted to improve the symmetry. This is more difficult to achieve with conventional liposuction in which the fat is collected in a large canister. 
2. Combination with fat grafting. Fat grafting is done to correct deformities of liposuction or pre-existing asymmetries. Since the aspirated fat is collected in syringes, it does not require any complex processing for it to be injected back into the body.  
3. Lower cost. The disposables used in syringe liposuction are not expensive. It does not involve any costly equipment. This helps reduce the cost of the procedure. 
4. No sound or smoke. The absence of any electrical moving parts makes this a very quiet and smoke-free procedure.

Syringe liposuction was introduced by Toledo in 1989. The advantages of this technique make it very endearing to some practitioners of liposuction. One of them includes me.  

For more information about liposuction, please click here.

For more information about gynecomastia, please click here.