Treatment Solutions for Gynecomastia

With most health conditions, patients don’t typically use the Latinized medical term that doctors favor. Tummy tuck is easier to say than abdominoplasty; facelift is simpler and clearer than rhytidectomy. But gynecomastia is an exception. Many patients embrace it, because the popular names for this condition are embarrassingly vivid in their descriptiveness: “male breasts,” “man boobs” and the compact but even more humbling “moobs.”

Experienced Scottsdale and Mesa plastic surgeon Dr. Genaro Valladolid is skilled in eliminating this condition, not by renaming it, but by applying effective surgical solutions to return your upper body shape to the masculine profile you remember.

Causes of Gynecomastia

Enlargement of the male breast tissue happens in different ways for different types of people. For example, patients who were once obese and have lost substantial weight will often experience loose folds of skin on the chest. The amount of this excess skin depends on whether a patient’s skin is flexible enough to shrink as fat volume is reduced.

Patients with normal weight often see glandular enlargement, the type of gynecomastia that is triggered by changes in hormones. Patients who have a very low BMI, including bodybuilders who have used steroids, may develop an enlarged breast profile when excess tissue develops behind the areola. This tissue often feels like a solid lump.

Proven Solutions

Each type of patient will require a different surgical solution, ranging from removal of tissue through a small incision to removal supplemented by liposuction or even surgically cutting away excess skin.

In some cases, liposuction can completely resolve gynecomastia. It depends upon whether the excess volume in the breast area is caused by growth of fat or glandular tissue. If you are overweight, there is a good chance that most of the breast volume is comprised of fat. Men who are thin or who have taken steroids usually need to undergo an excision procedure to restore a masculine profile. In some patients, using both liposuction and excision will be appropriate.

Gynecomastia surgery requires both skill and artistry. Shaping a natural profile involves removing strategic amounts of fat and glandular tissue, rather than performing an extensive reduction that will create surface depressions or, in overweight patients, may make the chest seem unnaturally out of proportion with the abdomen. This is especially true if the patient later loses a great deal of weight. An experienced surgeon knows that a satisfying result depends on the aesthetic appeal of the new profile, not the quantity of fat removed.

For more information about gynecomastia, please call (480) 770-5015 or email Valladolid Plastic Surgery today.