Why Our Hybrid Deep Plane Facelift Excels Above Others

The decision to devote your time, money, and energy to a facelift isn’t something you’re making lightly, so we feel it’s incumbent upon us to deliver the best results possible.

In 2022, plastic surgeons performed nearly 350,000 facial surgeries in the United States, including facelifts, facial fat grafting, neck lifts, and more. Further, many different kinds of facelifts exist, from deep plane to skin only.

At Jonathan Zelken, MD, board-certified plastic surgeon Dr. Zelken has garnered a well-earned reputation for delivering facelift results that dial back the years and last long into the future. And there’s a good reason for this — Dr. Zelken combines the best facelift approaches into a hybrid procedure that rises head and shoulders above the others.

Called a deep plane hybrid facelift, here’s a brief description of this innovative approach to restoring youth and vitality to your appearance.

A facelift that gets to all the layers

Let’s start by explaining our hybrid facelift using medical jargon, but we’ll try to do it in the simplest way possible.

The tissues that you see in your face and neck contain five layers:

1. Your skin
2. Subcutaneous fat
3. Superficial fascia, or superficial musculoaponeurotic system (SMAS)
4. Loose aponeurotic tissue
5. Deep fascia

When we perform a facelift, we go below the surface to make changes in the different layers that will work together to provide natural-looking, lasting results.

A hybrid deep plane and SMAS plication facelift

 If you’ve been researching facelifts, you’ve likely stumbled upon the terms “deep plane,” “skin only,” or terms involving SMAS. 

Our deep-plane hybrid facelift combines the best elements of each. To paint a clearer picture, here’s a brief, step-by-step guide of what we accomplish during this facelift.

Fat harvest and transfer

Our first step is to address any fat atrophy in your face by harvesting and transferring fat to where your face can use more volume. Unlike dermal fillers, transferring fat is a permanent solution for volume loss.

Elevation and resuspension of the SMAS in your midface

Taking great care to preserve your skin envelope, we isolate the SMAS tissues in your face and lift and elevate them into position, one side at a time. Using internal sutures that dissolve on their own, we fixate this layer into position, using strong anchor points around your ears.

This is the most exciting step in the procedure because when we reposition your SMAS, we can lift and smooth out jowls, marionette lines, perioral mounds, nasolabial folds, and sagging skin in your mid and lower face.

Tightening your neck 

Once we address the deep planes in your midface, we can tighten your neck tissues without making incisions below your chin.

Putting your skin back into position

The final step of our deep plane hybrid facelift is as important as the others — reattaching the ends of your skin. Before we do this, we may trim away some of the edges of your newly positioned SMAS so that you don’t have a telltale ridgeline around the sides of your face.

Next, we draw the edges of your skin together, placing great emphasis on respectful soft tissue handling. We not only gently handle your skin but also avoid tension on the tissues as we bring the ends together to prevent damage to the skin and bruising. Lastly, we use a meticulous suturing technique to avoid scarring.

Because of our careful handling, you’ll get to your great results quicker, as there's less trauma to your delicate tissues.

If you’d like a visual look at our deep plane hybrid facelift, we invite you to check out this video (warning: it’s graphic).

If you’d like to learn more about our deep plane hybrid facelift, please contact our office in Newport Beach, California, at (949) 432-4730.  You can also use our online booking tool to request a consultation.