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895 Park Avenue | New York, NY 10075 | 212.NAT.URAL
Have you started to notice that your face doesn't look quite as young as
you feel?
If you want a natural, younger-looking face—without looking like you've had surgery—a NaturaliftSM may be right for you.
The photos below show an actual patient who had a NaturaliftSM by Dr. Sterry.


For more examples, visit our photo gallery
A Naturalife is Dr. Sterry's minimally invasive facelift technique that:
Women and men as young as their 40s may be good candidates for a NaturaliftSM. It all depends on the degree of facial aging as well as their goals for achieving a younger-looking face.
There are many variations of mini-facelifts available today. Dr. Sterry has developed his own signature technique, the NaturaliftSM, that uses a small scar like many of these mini-facelifts—but goes deeper into the facial muscles and produces remarkable, natural-looking results.
For a comparison of facelift techniques, see our facelift comparison chart
“Most people think a facelift is a facelift is a facelift. They might think that one plastic surgeon does it better than another, but I don't know how much they understand about the techniques and how many variations there are—and this is critical to really knowing what at you're getting into.”
“I've decided not to use the term ‘mini-facelift’ to describe what I do in my practice. In my hands, I have to be more aggressive in some ways—not less—to get the best, most natural-looking results.
“I've found I can get a wonderful result through a pretty small incision. So I call my technique a NaturaliftSM
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This information is merely an introduction to Dr. Sterry's NaturaliftSM technique. To find out if this procedure is right for you, contact Dr. Sterry. In your personal consultation, he will evaluate you, listen to your goals for achieving a more youthful face and advise you on how you can achieve the look you desire.
“A NaturaliftSM is essentially a big operation performed through a small hole. I'm doing almost everything I would do with a full-facelift incision—but I'm using a smaller incision to get it done.”
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A NaturaliftSM is essentially a big operation performed through a small hole. I'm doing almost everything I would do with a full-facelift incision—but I'm using a smaller incision to get it done. |
“It's a little bit more difficult to work through a smaller incision, but I'm very happy with the results—less swelling, faster recovery.
The incision is made from behind the hairline in the temple region and travels down in front of and then inside of the ear down to the earlobe, and stops there. It is actually camouflaged very well by your own hair and the natural lines in and around the ear.
“The first thing I do in a NaturaliftSM is to undermine the skin of the face, which means to lift and free the skin from the tissue below. I have found that there are some places where I undermine more than other plastic surgeons, and some where I undermine much less in an effort to make it look natural when I'm done. I don't want the patient's face to look like it's swept back.”
“Some mini-facelift methods involve just a little bit of skin undermining, and then, to tighten up the covering of the facial muscles—what we call the SMAS—the surgeon puts in a couple of sutures, then closes the skin and you're out. It doesn't take very long at all. Some plastic surgeons do five of these mini-facelifts in a day.
“But how much can a person really expect to accomplish with just a little local anesthetic and an hour-long procedure?”
“Yes. I like to not just put sutures in to tighten the facial muscles, but to actually make a second plane of dissection—undermine, or go under that SMAS and lift that and really hoist it up and suture it very tightly - so that I can leave the skin loose and natural looking.”
“Going below the SMAS has two effects:
“I have tried many times to do less, because I wanted to believe that I could just put in a few sutures to tighten things up and stop there—but I was never as satisfied as I am now that I'm more aggressive.”
“Many mini-facelift procedures use sutures from one part of the SMAS to another to make a ‘pleat’ and tighten it up, but it doesn't actually move the SMAS in relation to the underlying tissue. Those procedures don't really go under the SMAS and pull it up the way that I do in a NaturaliftSM
“I've found that if I go below the SMAS, it might take me an extra hour or so in the OR, but I think it creates a much better result.”
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“In some cases, I will make another incision under the chin and either take out more fat, sew muscle together, remove muscle or take out some of the deep fat. It all depends on the exact anatomy that I'm working with.”
“I perform Naturalifts on an outpatient basis at Mount Sinai Hospital or in one of the nearby surgical facilities.”
“It takes 2-3 hours, depending on what the patient needs. For example, if a patient has a lot of neck work done—if there is a lot muscle banding or fat in the area—the surgery will take more time. It really depends on what I'm trying to accomplish.”
“A NaturaliftSM is typically done under general anesthesia; you will be asleep for the entire procedure. Or you may choose to have the procedure done
under sedation.”
“Recovery from a NaturaliftSM is pretty quick—patients can go back to work in six or seven days. If I do a full facelift, the recovery time is 10 days to
two weeks.”
“It's very individualized. Skin quality has a lot to do with it. But for patients in their 40s or early 50s, with a little bit of jowling and neck sagging, and deepening of the nasolabial folds, the NaturaliftSM is a great operation.”
“I've found that with the smaller incision, I can give people a nice-looking neck, eliminate the jowls and improve the nasolabial folds. The fat that had fallen down into the jowls is moved up to the mid-face, which makes you look like you had the rosier cheeks you had when you were younger.”
“The SMAS, or superficial musculoaponeurotic system, is the covering below the skin, but above the muscle layer, which is also attached to one of the muscles that gives you those bands in your neck. That's why, if you pull on the SMAS, you actually get some degree of neck lift.
“In my NaturaliftSM, the whole SMAS gets lifted—the direction of lift is mostly up, not so much back. Personally, I think the majority of the problem with the aging face is that the tissues descend. It's not that they fall toward the middle of the face, so pulling back is not typically necessary.
“I do pull back a little bit, but for the most part, I want to bring that volume into the upper part of the cheeks.”
Thomas P. Sterry, MD Plastic Surgery | 895 Park Avenue | New York, NY 10075 | 212.NAT.URAL (628-8725)
Copyright © 2007 Thomas P. Sterry, MD Plastic Surgery. All rights reserved.