Patients often have questions about visceral fat. What is it and how does it impact their long term results after a tummy tuck. For every tummy tuck patient, Dr. Albright has some simple tests for patients to determine if visceral fat might be an issue. Below is his introductory video for visceral fat.
Visceral fat is also known as intra-abdominal fat. This is fat that's stored inside your abdominal cavity around your intestines and organs. I use the analogy of your abdominal cavity as the inner balloon which contains organs, gas, urine, and visceral fat. The outer balloon is the skin and fat just underneath the skin.
For some people, they are more prone to storing fat inside their abdomen than other people. Typically fat storage is prioritized for each person. For some people, it is in their thighs, stomach, inner abdomen, back, etc. Typically the first place someone stores fat is the last place they will lose it. If you're prone to storing fat on the inside of your abdomen, liposuction is not able to get in to the abdominal cavity to remove that fat. If we can't remove this visceral fat, the circumference of the inner balloon may stay relatively large and it's going to limit how flat you can make your stomach.
Stay tuned for our next educational video on this!
Sustainable weight loss is the only answer. Once you have learned how to check yourself for visceral fat and find that that has improved then this is the time to schedule your consultation for abdominal contouring surgery.
If you found this video helpful check out our other videos and stay tuned for our follow-up video!
