How Soon Can I Have New Cheek Implants Placed?

Q: Dr. Eppley, I recently had cheek implants and facial liposuction done just a week ago. While my face is distorted from the swelling I already know that the cheek implants are not right. They are asymmetric and in the wrong place. After speaking with my surgeon, he stated he would only remove the old 2.5mm implants and would be unwilling to place new implants at the time of removal. What I don’t like is that there is still no projection to my midface in profile, which is my primary reason for undergoing the procedure. I’m curious if a 4mm silastic implant would provide a better result. I wanted to look like Jessica Biel or Megan Fox. Please let me know your opinion. If your professional opinion is to keep the 2.5mm, then I would still like to try a filler for the area directly below my eye to give my midface more projection and also to discuss refining my chin/jaw. 

A: I am glad to hear that you have gotten to speak to your original surgeon as he is the one who knows what type of cheek implants were placed (I know its Medpor but don’t know the style)

While your cheek implants can certainly be replaced (cheek implant revision), an important issue would be to known what  is the starting point. While the swelling in your face has come down, there is still about 50% swelling to resolve. So my concern is that the shape of your face is not completely ‘known’ nor is the final effects of what the current cheek implants will look like. That makes to hard to know what cheek implant style to change into when you are working with a ‘moving target’ as the swelling goes down and the final shape of the current implants become evident. What you don’t want to do is to change the implants and then find out what you have changed into is no better for a different reason.

It is also unclear as to what you mean by more ‘midface projection’. The term midface is an ambiguous one and means different things to different people so more clarification on this issue is needed. Cheek implants in general do not create midface projection, they create cheek projection.

Dr. Barry Eppley

Indianapolis, Indiana