Will My Fat Injection Brow Bone Augmentation Go Down In Size?

Q: Dr. Eppley, I had brow bone augmentation by fat grafting done yesterday, and I think my surgeon placed 8cc per side. I told my surgeon not to be aggressive, but I’m worried that he might have overdone it. It currently looks like an excessive amount of augmentation. Do you think this is what the final look will be, or will the amount of augmentation decrease to a reasonable amount with time?

A: Fat grafting to the face, by injection, is unfortunately not uniform in its outcomes or how well they survive. While there are a lot of variables in what makes an injected fat graft survive, and one can not assume that every surgeon does every step of fat grafting the same, the face has variable rates of fat graft take by region. The brow area has only a moderate fat graft take between 20% to 30%. Thus overinjection is commonly done knowing that much of the injected fat will take. That is why your surgeon uses 8ccs per side with the outcome likely to be only 1cc to 2ccs of fat that will actually take. So what you are seeing today will change and will go down substantially over the first month after brow fat grafting surgery. Ironically the concern you have today (too much) may turn into the opposite concern (too little) six weeks from now.

Dr. Barry Eppley

Indianapolis, Indiana