The recent Aesthetic Surgery Journal had another study on BBL fat grafting. This was “Safe Gluteal Fat Avoiding a Vascular or Nervous Injury: An Anatomical Study in Cadavers.” It was out of Mexico, looking at 10 fresh cadavers. Their goal was to see how to avoid the 0.2% fat embolism rate. I know that rate number seems inconsequential, but if you read my other blogs on BBL, you will know that fat emboli are devastating. Once they occur, they cannot be reversed, and result in death for many patients.
The study:
- 10 fresh cadavers
- 4 groups.
- group 1: injections were done through the upper inner buttock (the top of the bottom between the cheeks)
- group 2: lower gluteal sulcus
- group 3: pretrochanteric (outer buttock near the hip)
- group 4: same as group one, but didn’t angle it as widely. (only 0 – 10 degrees)
- Findings:
- group 1 had complications (with the 30 degree angle)
- group 2 had complications in ALL the injections
- group 3 had complications
- group 4 had NO complications.
Conclusion?
Where you put your incision makes a difference. They like the fat grafting done through the upper medial gluteal incision, with a 0 to -10 degree angle, and the supragluteal injection at a – 30 degree angle to get the outer hip can address the whole area needed to be grafted more safely.
Injecting through the lower gluteal crease was a no no.
My thoughts?
This is an area being studied extensively. As these studies come out, we will start to form a clearer and clearer idea of how to inject fat into the buttocks safely. This was a small study, and done in cadavers. Until the dust settles, I will continue with my recommendations to do little amounts and stay superficial if doing any contouring.