What is a Brow Lift?
Brow lift surgery elevates your brow area, correcting drooping eyebrows and smoothing forehead wrinkles to restore your face's neutral expression. Besides potentially betraying your age, a sagging brow can make you look sad, tired, or even angry. If it hangs low enough, it can also interfere with your peripheral vision. Brow lifts work well for both patients with early signs of aging and those whose brow aging is more advanced.
We want you to understand what a brow lift is, but also what it isn't. Perhaps because the two surgeries are often performed together, we encounter a lot of confusion about the difference between a brow lift and an eyelid lift (blepharoplasty). An eyelid lift literally focuses on the eyelids while a brow lift impacts the eyebrows and forehead. You may benefit from both procedures, but you can absolutely have one without the other.
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Types of Brow Lift
When planning your brow lift, your plastic surgeon will choose the surgical approach that best accommodates your aesthetic goals and unique anatomy. There are four primary techniques used in brow lifts, and the differences between them primarily revolve around incision placement. The four types of brow lift are:
- Temporal: A minimal approach, the temporal brow lift involves incisions at either side of the forehead and focuses on lifting just the outer third of the eyebrows.
- Endoscopic: During an endoscopic brow lift, the surgeon makes small, 1-inch incisions at the hairline. They then use a small camera to visualize the area and manipulate surgical instruments within the space, lifting the eyebrows and suturing the tissue in place. This approach is subtle and best for patients with minor forehead aging.
- Direct or Mid-Forehead: The incisions for these techniques are made just above your eyebrows (direct) or within the natural furrows of your forehead (mid-forehead). This approach is rare but helpful when patients have severe signs of aging. It works well for correcting deep forehead creases and benefits balding men for whom we can't hide the incisions in the hairline.
- Coronal: Also known as an open brow lift, a coronal lift involves placing a single incision along the hairline from ear to ear. This approach is most often used for women with small foreheads, as this technique can lift the hairline.
No matter what technique your surgeon chooses, the overall goal of all brow lifts remains the same — to smooth and tighten the skin of the forehead and raise the eyebrows to a higher position.
Brow Lift Recovery
After brow lift surgery, expect your forehead to be swollen and bruised. Getting plenty of rest is important, so you'll need to take off work for a few days. If you have a desk job, you'll likely be back at work within 10 to 14 days. More rigorous jobs may require more downtime, however, and you could be home for two to three weeks. Recovery may progress a bit more quickly after an endoscopic procedure, however.
While recovering, rest often and keep your head elevated as much as you can. You will need to resume your normal activities gradually, postponing strenuous activities until several weeks after surgery.
Your surgeon will give you detailed instructions on how to care for your incisions. If necessary, we'll schedule an appointment for you to have your stitches removed. Dissolving sutures are common, though, and eliminate the need for removal.
How Long Does a Brow Lift Last?
Some patients find that their brow lift lasts them a lifetime. Others do start to notice some sagging again as time and gravity march on. Even these patients usually enjoy the results of their lift for at least 10 to 12 years, however, and find the procedure well worth the investment.