Thigh lift

The skin of the medial thigh is thin and inelastic, and laxity here is often the earliest sign of ageing in the thighs. The medial thigh skin is also one of the areas most affected following weight loss. The majority of skin laxity occurs at the junction of the anterior and medial thigh, where the skin tends to hang in a dependent, pleated fashion. This can interfere with walking, toileting, and various other day-to-day activities, resulting in irritation due to chaffing between the thighs. Body contouring techniques are routinely combined in stages to achieve a more harmonious result. Medial thigh lift is frequently combined with upper body lift or breast surgery, or both, whereas brachioplasty is usually combined with abdominoplasty/lower body lift. Opposing vectors of pull and excessive damage to local vascularity are thereby avoided. However, staging surgical procedures has the potential to reveal additional areas of dissatisfaction to the patient. Abdominoplasty patients often report increased dissatisfaction with the medial thighs as a consequence of this previously hidden deformity becoming visible to them postoperatively. In fact, massive weight-loss patients’ dissatisfaction with their thighs is almost as great as with the changes to their breasts in terms of their severely decreased self-esteem, sexuality, and quality of life.

Analysis and Interpretation of Google Trends Data on Public Interest in Cosmetic Body Procedures

Background Several online resources such as Google Trends (GT) enable plastic surgeons to track search volume trends for cosmetic procedures. Understanding these data may allow surgeons to better anticipate patients’ interests and meet their needs. Objectives The authors sought to evaluate the correlation between GT search volumes and annual surgery volumes. Methods Search terms were generated using the “related queries” feature of GT. Data were obtained for the terms breast augmentation, buttock augmentation, buttock implants, buttock lift, calf augmentation, liposuction, lower body lift, thighplasty, abdominoplasty, and brachioplasty from January 2004 to November 2017. Annual volumes for respective procedures were obtained from statistics reports of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS) from 2006 to 2017 and American Society of Aesthetic Plastic Surgery (ASAPS) from 2004 to 2017. Correlations were evaluated applying univariate linear regression of GT data to both ASPS and ASAPS data. Results Geographical and temporal variations in search volume were detected during the study. Search volume trends that correlated significantly with both ASPS and ASAPS surgery volume trends were: “butt implants surgery” (ASPS: R2 = 0.366, P = 0.049; ASAPS: R2 = 0.380, P = 0.019); “liposuction” (ASPS: R2 = 0.690, P = 0.002; ASAPS: R2 = 0.578, P = 0.002); and “liposuction surgery” (ASPS: R2 = 0.672, P = 0.002; ASAPS: R2 = 0.476, P = 0.006). Several search terms demonstrated no significant relationships, negative correlations, or were significant with only one database. Conclusions This study characterizes GT as a convenient and informative data set for plastic surgeons to analyze patient interest in cosmetic body-sculpting procedures. GT represents a useful instrument for tailoring marketing strategies and addressing the needs of our patient population.