How Can I Get A More Chiseled Face?

Q: Dr. Eppley, My face looks swollen and fatter. How can I achieve a chiseled face look and get better defined facial look. I have attached some pictures of me to review.

A: Thank you for sending your pictures. Compared to many patients with darker skin pigmentation your tissues are not quite as thick as I suspected they would be. What you do have is vertical facial shortening of the lower third of your face with a flat mandibular plane. As a result there are some positive things you can do to your face including vertical chin lengthening and/or total jawline vertical lengthening combined with buccal lipectomies  and possibly cheek augmentation. Stretching out the lower third of the face and adding highlights at the ‘five corners’ (cheeks, chin and jaw angles) is what can make a face more angular.

Many men seek a more chiseled face. But surgically achieving it in the way now may want it is often not possible. The men who get closer to a more chiseled face are those that already have a thin face where skeletal augmentation of the cheeks, chin and jaw angles is best revealed. Defatting a face alone rarely if ever achieve much increased definition. Facial defatting should be looked at as a complementary procedure to changing the shape of the facial bones.

Dr. Barry Eppley

Indianapolis, Indiana