Do you lose weight when you do CoolSculpting?

CoolSculpting is an innovative procedure that eliminates stubborn, undesirable pockets of fat. During CoolSculpting treatment, the device exposes the fat cells in the treatment area to temperatures of around 15 degrees.

Those extremely low temperatures destruct the fat cells, and the body eliminates them naturally in the next few weeks.

Pounds Lost

As CoolSculpting helps eliminate fat, it is understandable for patients to wonder if it can assist them in weight-loss as well. But CoolSculpting is not designed for weight-loss. The patient may lose a few pounds in the months after their treatment as the body processes and expels the excess fat.

However, CoolSculpting is not a replacement for a weight-loss program. The surgeon will likely ask the patient to lose weight prior to CoolSculpting if they are obese or overweight.

The same rules are applicable to liposuction. Both of these procedures will eliminate enough fat to cause significant weight loss. In addition, the manner in which CoolSculpting works is somewhat different from the way weight-loss works.

Muse Plastic Surgery, led by double board certified plastic surgeon Dr. Wright Jones, provides CoolSculpting fat reduction to patients in Atlanta, Buckhead, Stockbridge, Marietta, GA, and surrounding communities.

What Occurs When You Lose Weight

Upon losing weight, either with diet or exercise alone or through weight-loss surgery, the size of the fat cells shrinks. The less a person consumes and the more energy they burn, the smaller their fat cells.

However, the cells still exist in the body. Weight-loss does not remove fat from the body. Rather, the amount of fat that an individual has is pre-determined by their genes.

The amount of fat that a person has as a teenager is often similar to the amount of fat that an adult may have, although it may appear as if they have a higher degree of fatty tissue during younger years.

The change occurs in the size of those fat cells. If a person goes on a diet and loses weight, their fat cells shrink. If they regain weight or never make efforts to reduce it, the fat cells grow bigger. A person may put on weight, but they are not gaining new fat cells.

Plastic surgeon to the stars Dr. Wright Jones provides CoolSculpting to the right candidates for predictable and most effective results.

How does Fat Develop?

If the body does not produce new fat cells, how does the extra fat develop when a person puts on weight? This fat comes from the food they consume.

The food moves through the digestive system every time a person eats. Then it reaches the liver, which is the organ that processes and detoxifies food and substances. The liver converts the fat from food into energy for the body to use.

The bodies of some people use a lot of energy. Therefore, fat is used quite rapidly. On the other hand, other individuals are slower to use energy. Or, they may have eaten much more food than their body requires. The body will need to store this excess fat somewhere.

So it gets accumulated in the fat cells that already exist in the body, making them larger.

What Happens During Coolsculpting

The process behind CoolSculpting is not the same as the process for weight loss. CoolSculpting does not shrink the fat cells. It effectively destroys them. CoolSculpting can eliminate anywhere from 20 to 25 percent of cells in the treatment area.

This procedure only impacts the fat in the treated site. Also, the fat from an untreated site cannot travel over to replace the fat in the treated area.

What happens to the dead fat cells? The body processes these cells through its natural metabolic processes and eventually eliminates them. The fat cells begin to disintegrate as they are in the process of dying. However, that disintegration is not enough to eliminate the fat.

The other cells of the body help get rid of these dying fat cells. Those cells rapidly consume the disintegrated, dead fat cells. Over a period of many weeks or even months, the body works hard to flush out these dead fat cells permanently.

What to Do If You Want to Lose Weight

If a person is considering CoolSculpting but needs to lose weight before the procedure, they have options. Dieting and exercising is one option, which is suitable for people who are not significantly overweight but could stand to reduce 20 or so pounds.

If the patient has a substantial amount of weight to lose, they may consider weight-loss surgery. This procedure can physically reduce the stomach’s size so that the patient eats less at each meal. Many patients who undergo weight-loss surgery are able to reduce 50 percent or more of their body weight.

CoolSculpting may often not be suitable for body contouring after significant weight loss. The patient may require liposuction and surgery to lift and tighten their skin after they have lost a substantial amount of weight.

Celebrity plastic surgeon Dr. Wright Jones receives patients from Atlanta, Buckhead, Stockbridge, Marietta, GA, and nearby areas for CoolSculpting body contouring treatments. See all plastic surgery procedures that Cosmetic Plastic Surgeon Dr. Wright Jones performs of the face, nose, body, and breast in and around Atlanta, Buckhead, Stockbridge, Marietta, GA and surrounding areas.