After spending years developing and enhancing cosmetic surgery procedures for the breasts, some U.S. plastic surgeons are aiming their focus on the behind. Buttocks surgeries are performed to either increase the size of the derriere with silicone implants or give a fuller shape with fat injections.

Buttocks surgeries are on the rise as more and more patients seek perfect posteriors. Last year, 2,361 Americans underwent buttocks-augmentation surgery, double the number who received the procedure in 2001, according to the American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery.

“The buttocks used to be something you hid, but now it's something you show off,” says Dr. Thomas L. Roberts III, a South Carolina plastic surgeon who has performed hundreds of buttocks-augmentation surgeries.

According to Dr. V. Leroy Young, a St. Louis plastic surgeon and chairman of the emerging-trends task force of the ASAPS, enhancing the size of the gluteus dates back to ancient times when Spartan women performed buttocks-kicking dances.

In the 1950s, plastic surgeons in Brazil and Mexico tried to transfer abdomen fat to the buttocks in an effort to increase the size of the posterior. But most of the fat was absorbed into the body.

Then in the late 1990s, Roberts adapted the fat-grafting cosmetic surgery technique that was developed for the face to enhance the behind. In this procedure, fat is taken from the abdomen and thighs by liposuction, purified with antibiotics, and injected into the buttocks. The thousands of fat droplets must be injected individually to mimic real skin and muscles.

“It's like sculpting with clay,” says Roberts. “You are trying to create a shape tailored to each individual patient and a fullness of the outer buttocks that you can't get with implants.”

Patients are advised not to sit down or lay on their backs for several weeks after buttocks-augmentation surgery. Recovery time is dependant on each individual.

Please contact us today for more information about buttocks cosmetic surgery procedures or to consult with an experienced board certified plastic surgeon.