WHAT THE DIFFERENT LIPOSUCTION FAT COLORS MEAN

Posted On: April 10, 2015 Author: The Office of Dr. Stuart Linder Posted In: Liposuction, Plastic Surgery

The color of the fat within the liposuction cannula can give you great indication as to the amount of blood loss from the surgery. Below, you will see several examples of liposuction fat. All of these examples were suctioned by Dr. Linder with the patient under general anesthesia and given tumescent fluid per 1 liter of normal saline, 1:100,000 epinephrine and 40 cc of 1% plain Lidocaine mix. Notice the darker specimen shows more blood within the mix and a cobblestone-like appearance. Patients who undergo straight liposuction without tumescent technique will end up with very bloody-appearing fat in which there is no cobblestoning appearance to the tissue and there is a significant amount of red blood streamlined confluently with the fatty adipose tissue. Notice as the tissue becomes more bright yellow, this is associated with a significantly minimal amount of blood loss. In fact, in real tumescent fluid it has been found that the blood aspirate is less than 1% of the total amount of aspirate removed, 99% fat, 1% blood. Pure liposuctioning using the tumescent technique with the epinephrine causing its vasoconstrictive effect and reducing bruising and blood loss is very effective.

It is the goal standard with the American Board of Plastic Surgery that liposuctioning should be performed by only Board Certified Surgeons who have the experience and training to understand the anatomy of the human body, including risks and complications by liposculpturing in areas remote and deep to the fatty areas.