Dr. Brace talks Facelift Complications

We're back for another #facialplasticsfriday!
We were talking last about facelifts and now we want to slightly digress and talk about some complications of facelifts (but also surgeries of all types.)
Listen in as Dr. Brace teaches us all about hematomas and things to watch out for post-surgery in today's #facialplasticsfriday.
What is a hematoma you may ask?
Hematoma is the medical term for bleeding that occurs under the skin after surgery. This can stem from any type of surgery where you've made an incision and created a pocket. This is usually caused by a spike in the blood pressure where bleeding will occur and gets trapped under the skin. Essentially... it's like a water balloon where the blood vessel is bleeding and the skin is not letting the blood out. So whatever part of your body the hematoma is occurring, it starts to expand as it's under pressure. Fun visual right? 🙄
In facelifts, there are risks of hematomas (1-2%) that we see occasionally. Normally they are small (dime-sized) and occur right behind the ear and can be resolved by aspirating the area with a needle.
In the past 10 days, Dr. Brace has performed 6 facelifts at GFP and has seen (2) small hematomas. It can happen at any point in the first week of healing but usually, they happen overnight (first 24 - 72 hours) so we always recommend monitoring for hematomas in the first 10 days post-surgery.
Follow-ups after facelifts are so important which is why we see patients post-surgery on days 1 & 7 and therein, 1 month, 3 months, 6 months & 1 year.
Send us your questions as we are going to continue with facelift complications next week!
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