Tummy Tuck Surgery – Mini vs full Tummy Tuck

Mr Adrian Richards, leading plastic and cosmetic surgery at Aurora Clinics explains the difference between a Mini Tummy Tuck and Full Tummy Tuck. For more information or should you wish to book a FREE Consultation with our specialist plastic surgeon, please call us on 01844 214362.

Tummy Tuck Surgery – Mini vs. Full Tummy Tuck

Hello. My name is Adrian Richards and I’m a plastic and cosmetic surgeon. Today I’m going to be talking a little bit about the different types of tummy tucks. This is a procedure which is also known as an abdominoplasty and an apronectomy. So it’s slightly confusing terminology. So tummy tucks are basically divided into three types of surgery:  scar revision, a mini tummy tuck, and a full tummy tuck.

So who’s generally thinking about a tummy tuck is really people who have been pregnant, particularly if they’ve had more than one child and pregnancy stretches, obviously, the skin of the abdomen and also causes some trauma to the muscles, particularly separation of the rectus abdominis muscles, which are the two main vertical muscles in the stomach, in the tummy which tend to move apart slightly after pregnancy.

So three types of abdominoplasty. The first one is scar revision. So often people who have had Caesareans, because Caesarean scars tend to adhere to the muscle underneath the skin, so you tend to get an overhang. It’s very common to get an overhang of skin and some subcutaneous tissue, some fatty tissue overhanging the scar because the scar is tethered. So the most simple thing we can do is a scar revision which basically removes the Caesarean scar back to fresh tissue on either side, frees it up from the muscle underneath, and the skin is sewn together, fresh skin sewn together, so you get a nice flat appearance without the overhang and nothing is done to the tummy button in a scar revision. So the old Caesarean scar will be gone. The scar will be slightly longer than the old Caesarean scar, but generally works very well and very little downtime.

The next stage up is what’s called a mini tummy tuck. Now this is used basically on people who haven’t got enough tissue to remove all of the skin from the Caesarean scar, or where the Caesarean scar would have been, if you haven’t got one, to the tummy button. So in a mini tummy tuck, the lower tissue is removed and the belly button is left unchanged. So no cut around the belly button. The belly button is moved slightly downwards, but no scar around the belly button and an ellipse, a sort of semicircle, of skin is removed including the Caesarean scar if you’ve got one, the scar is slightly longer than a Caesarean scar and it tightens up the lower part of the tummy. And the muscles can be repaired during a mini tummy tuck if they need to be.

Moving on, a full tummy tuck can be performed, and in that procedure all of the tissue is removed between the Caesarean scar and the tummy button. The tummy button, where the tummy button was is then brought downwards and sewn to the area above the pubic hair, and the belly button is cut out, left on a stalk, and then the skin of the tummy comes down and the belly button is brought out through a new hole. So you have to create a new incision for the belly button to come through. So it’s your belly button in the same place as your belly button is now, but the skin’s brought down and a new hole is used for the belly button and that’s a full tummy tuck. Now in a full tummy tuck, or with any of these procedures, you can also have liposuction, and liposuction is normally performed to the flanks, so to the side areas, if you need it when you’re having a tummy tuck.

There is a procedure called an extended abdominoplasty, and this is really for people who don’t only have the excess tissue in the front but have the tissue in the side. And I’ll talk about that and a body lift in which the tissue is removed all the way around in a separate video.

So I hope that’s been informative. Thanks for watching the videos, and we hope to see you soon.