Understanding the Brow as a Balloon:  The Role of Fat Grafting to the Brow

One of the most confusing things that I do is to inflate a brow/upper eyelid with fat or filler when someone instinctively thinks that her brow is already too heavy and sagging.  If someone really does not get it, all I have to do is put a little filler in the brow and almost instantaneously I get a response, “Wow I look good!”  Why is that the case?  The reason is that the brow actually does not fall with gravity as one ages.  Instead, the brow that is full of fat in youth becomes deflated over time so that it looks saggy when in fact it is just empty.  Think of the brow like a balloon that is full in youth and as one becomes older it deflates and by deflating it looks sagging.  Of course, it can sag a little bit but in most cases it sags very little.  It just looks sagging.  For one who is worried that this is not how he or she used to look like in youth, all you have to do is to look at your own photos when you were younger to see that the brows were actually fuller and not higher.  Another method is to look at photos of youthful women’s brows in fashion magazines like Glamour, Vogue, and Allure and you will see that brows are plump and not necessarily all that high.

This woman looks as if she needs to have an upper eyelid procedure and/or a browlift. All she had done was fat transfer to that area (and the rest of the face).

Samuel M. Lam, MD, FACS is a board certified plastic surgeon in Dallas, Texas. Call 972.312.8105 to schedule a consultation. Please visit the following pages to learn more about, fat transfer, upper eyelid or brow lift procedures, or feel free to ask Dr Lam a question in his plastic surgery forum.