Facial implant

Facial implants are used to enhance certain features of the face. The surgery may be elective, or needed as the result of prior surgery on the face. Through a facial implant, an oral and maxillofacial plastic surgeon can aesthetically improve facial contours. They can improve proportion and profiles and correct imbalance caused by injury or hereditary traits.

In most cases, facial implant surgery is completed on an outpatient basis in a hospital, a surgeon's office or a surgical center. A local anesthesia or oral sedative may be used, or the patient may be put to sleep during the procedure using general anesthesia.

The most common implants include:

Lower jaw implant. The implant is placed inside of the lower lip. The incision site will be secured with sutures that will dissolve in about one week.

Cheek Implants. The implant is placed internally through upper lip or externally via the lower eyelid. Sutures will vary depending on whether they're internal or external.

Chin implant. The implant is placed internally to the lower lip, or under the chin. As with the cheek implant, sutures will vary depending on whether they're internal or external.

Paranasal Implants. This augmentation procedure is a surgical procedure to permanently fill-in the depressed furrows from the side of the nose to the corners of the mouth and to thicken the paranasal region. A specially designed implant material is inserted into a small incision inside the mouth.

Each involves placing synthetic materials deep under the subcutaneous tissue and onto the underlying bone. There are several types of facial implants made of different materials.