Endoscopic Facelift Korea: What It Won't Lift, Who Should Skip It and What Sets the Cost

Hello, I'm Dr. Im Young Min, Chief Director and board-certified plastic surgeon at VG Plastic Surgery in Gangnam.

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Im Young Min

Chief Director · Board-certified in Plastic Surgery

• — Ph.D. in Medicine
• — Internship and residency, Seoul St. Mary's Hospital
• — Board-certified plastic surgeon, Seoul St. Mary's Hospital

Our facelift center lists Crystal, SMAS and mini facelifts, with brow lift and upper eyelid surgery in the same center, so the plan can follow where your face has actually dropped. Three board-certified anesthesiologists work here full time, and during surgery one of them watches your blood pressure, pulse and breathing while the surgeon only operates. If English isn't the language you're most at ease in, a medical interpreter for your language is provided at no extra charge.

If you're not sure which part has dropped, take two photos in daylight with your hair pulled back, one from the front and one from the side, and send them on WhatsApp with one question: does the droop start above my cheekbone or below it?

What can an endoscopic lift actually reach?

Under the skin of the forehead and temples lies a layer of tissue that can be freed from the bone and moved up as one sheet. An endoscope, a thin camera on a rod, lets the surgeon do that release through a handful of short cuts inside the hairline instead of one long incision across the scalp. Through the openings at the temples, the upper cheek can be raised a little too. No skin is cut away.

The lift comes from moving the tissue and holding it in place while it reattaches.

That is also where it stops. The jowl sits on the jawline, a long way from any scalp incision, and the pull fades with distance, much as lifting a tablecloth by one corner barely moves the far edge. A loose neck needs skin removed, and an endoscopic approach removes none.

One check before you compare quotes: the name endoscopic facelift is used for different operations. It can mean a forehead and brow lift only, a forehead plus midface lift, or a full facelift in which an endoscope helps with one part. Ask which areas a quote covers, in plain words, because the name alone won't tell you. If you aren't sure which layer has dropped on your own face, how to find the layer that dropped before choosing a lift goes through it area by area.

When I would tell you to skip it

I'll tell you plainly when an operation doesn't suit you, and an endoscopic lift has some clear reasons for that answer. These are the situations where I would steer you toward something else, or ask you to wait:

• Your main concern is the jaw or the neck. Jowls and neck bands are out of reach from the scalp. A lift through incisions around the ear is the conversation to have, and deep plane facelifts compared by layer explains what that changes.
• The heaviness is in the eyelid, not the brow. Stand at a mirror and lift your brow with a fingertip to where you'd like it. If the lid skin still folds onto your lashes, extra lid skin is part of the problem, and a brow lift won't remove it.
• Your forehead is already tall. An endoscopic lift tends to move the hairline up a little along with the brow.
• Your brows are very heavy and the forehead skin is thick. Moving tissue without removing any may hold less well, and the brow can drift back down.
• You smoke, take blood thinners you can't pause, or your blood pressure isn't controlled. Each raises the chance of bleeding or slow healing, so these come first.

Say you're 61 and your son in Atlanta is organizing the trip. In the mirror you see heavy lids, a brow that has slipped toward the eye, and a softer line along the jaw. An endoscopic lift could raise the brow and open the eye area, but the jaw would look much as it does now. What I'd want to know is which change bothers you day to day.

If it's the tired look around the eyes, a brow lift, perhaps with upper lid surgery measured once the brow is in its new place, may be all you need. If it's the jaw, a lift through incisions around the ear is the plan to discuss, and adding an endoscopic forehead lift to it makes sense only if the brow is truly low.

Numbness, brow weakness, hair loss: what can go wrong?

Most of what follows a forehead lift is temporary. A tight feeling across the forehead and a numb or itchy patch of scalp behind the incisions are common, and sensation often returns gradually over weeks to months as the small sensory nerves recover. How long the numbness and swelling last differs from one person to the next.

Less common, and more specific to this approach:

• Hair thinning right along an incision, which often grows back but not always.
• One brow sitting a little higher than the other, or both settling lower than they looked in the first week.
• Weakness of the nerve branch that raises the brow, so one side won't lift. This is usually temporary and recovers over weeks to months; rarely, it does not.

Infection and numbness: what to watch for

Rare but serious problems include bleeding under the skin that has to be drained, and infection. The American Society of Plastic Surgeons lists bleeding, infection, nerve injury, hair loss at the incision sites, numbness and poor wound healing among the risks of facelift surgery.

Risks and side effects to know

Wait, or rethink the plan, if you are pregnant or breastfeeding, have an infection or open sore on the scalp, had a forehead procedure in the last few months, or can't stop smoking or blood-thinning medicines and supplements for the period your surgeon asks.

Once you're home, the warning signs are swelling on one side that keeps growing, fever, an incision that opens or drains, or a brow that still won't move after several weeks. Before you fly out, book a visit with your family doctor or a local plastic surgeon for the week you get back, carry a copy of the operation note and your medicine list, and ask us before booking how questions after your return are handled.

If you take daily medicines or supplements, photograph the labels and send them on WhatsApp along with your photos, and ask which ones you'd need to pause and for how long.

Your days in Seoul and the flight home

Swelling after a forehead lift drifts down with gravity, so in the first days your eyelids and cheeks often look puffier than the forehead itself. Sleeping with your head raised helps the swelling settle, and the American Society of Plastic Surgeons' page on brow lift recovery is worth reading before you book.

Settle the number of nights with us before you buy flights, and leave one spare day in case anything needs a second look. Pack a shirt that buttons at the front, so nothing is pulled over your head, and a neck pillow for sleeping upright in the hotel and on the plane. For the flight itself, swelling, stitches and the flight home after a facelift covers what to expect in the air.

What sets the cost of an endoscopic lift?

For an endoscopic facelift, Korea adds one cost factor of its own: the nights you stay. The rest comes from the operation:

• Which areas are lifted: forehead and brow only, forehead plus midface, or an endoscopic forehead lift added to a facelift.
• What goes into the same session: upper eyelid surgery or fat grafting, if your face needs them.
• Anesthesia: given by one of our full-time anesthesiologists, and how long the operation takes.
• Revision: lifting a forehead that has been operated on before is more involved than a first lift.

Foreign patients pay the same surgery fee as Korean patients here, and the estimate is given in writing, so you can see which areas it covers before you decide. When the jaw is part of the plan, what sets the cost of a SMAS facelift covers that side of the estimate.

Ask on WhatsApp what your own combination would cost, with the front and side photos attached; the deposit and how you pay are settled after the consultation, so put that question in the same message if it shapes your planning. You can also start from our consultation and booking page.

Starting from home

Your first message can be short. One front photo in daylight is enough to begin, and you can ask before booking anything. If you have them, add the side photo and your travel dates, and ask whether the drop you see sits mainly in your brow, your cheek or your jaw. In Seoul, before we talk about which way to lift, I look at which layer has actually descended, because that tells us whether an endoscope is the right tool for your face at all.

VG Plastic Surgery is at 635 Nonhyeon-ro, Gangnam-gu, Seoul.

Related pages:

• Facelift surgery at VG Plastic Surgery