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Full and shapely lips can provide a look of health and youthfulness. Extremely thin lips may cause a patient to appear stern, severe, or old, and hence be a source of concern to the patient. Fortunately surgical techniques are available to successfully and predictably enhance lip volume for the improvement of appearance. Lack of lip fullness is usually an inherited trait; however localized lip deficiencies can occur from trauma, tumors, or as the result of congenital defects. There are a number of surgical methods to enlarge the lips. The most optimal methods however are those which utilize a patient’s own tissues. In the past local flaps from the inside of the lips were advanced to give fuller lips. More recently a wide variety of products have been promoted, including cadaveric (non-living) tissue, synthetic implants, and injectable fillers. Injectable fillers are not permanent and may be more expensive over a long period of time since the enhancement achieved is temporary. Despite the convenience of injecting a product from off the shelf, surgically harvested tissue from the patient themselves will provide a better and longer lasting result. The lips are largely composed of voluntary muscle. The grafting of the patients’ own fat or muscle within various tissue planes has proven to be quite successful. This allows for not only an aesthetically pleasing but a functional result as well, and as living tissue, it provides for a lasting result. Our goal and yours is to create a natural look; when a patient undergoes aesthetic surgery they do not want to look like they have had surgery. This is particularly important in lip enhancement. | ||||