Cosmetic surgery is not always plastic. It may use your extra adipose now, stow it away in a bank, and use it to re-vitalise your vital stats when they are drooping
So you have heard by now of plastic surgeons always making mountains out of molehills if you live in the real world of the fake. But the enterprise of cosmetic surgery has now made banks out of adipose. As surgeons will tell you, fat storage banks are in.
Hear of something like having a piece of your butt injected in your face? Bear with us.
Cosmetic surgeons are now offering to extract fat or adipose from places where you have excess of it, and store it for the time when gravity works its well-known charm on your breasts or buttocks.
The adipose extracted after metabolic surgeries can be pumped back in you to give your assets a lift when they are sagging.
Now that you know the etymology of the endearment 'buttface', know too that it is gender neutral. The concept has many takers, both among men and women, mostly in their early thirties.
At the clinic of Dr Mohan Thomas, a consultant surgeon at Breach Candy hospital, around 100 bags of fat lie in cold storage marked with the patient's name and the date it was extracted. The patients in question suffer from serious or mild cases of love handles or beer guts.
Dr Thomas advises them to store away micro-quantities of fat, anything from three to 500 ml, preserved at temperatures of 2 - 8 degrees. It will come in handy a few years down the line when age assaults their face with wrinkles.
Dr Thomas explains why grafting your own fat is a better bet than getting dermal filler injections. "A dermal filler injection to the face will fade in eight months but the fat will last longer.
Also, getting yourself pricked in the face regularly can lead to scar formation. There's certainly more downtime when you've had fat layered into your but the effect is more natural and longer lasting," he said.
So you see, under a seasoned surgeon's knife, your middle age spread may translate into a tensed up bottom later.
The adipose-derived beauty is not exclusive to women. Men also want a piece of it, their own fat that is, for later use. The patients are usually in their early 30s.
Dr Thomas said, "I had a woman come in on Wednesday who had four and a half litres of fat extracted from her body. We will preserve only 300 ml. I think the most you'd need to store away is up to a litre and that would only be if you required a butt augmentation procedure."
Thomas is currently charging regular patients nothing for stowing away their fat for up to two years, after which he discards the samples. Going under the knife in real time is of course another matter altogether, costing...
The business of getting things sucked, pumped, tightened and cut is serious and spreading, as is their storage. After blood and embryos, this is another thing you can have banks of.
Other clinics that do not have the storage facilities that Dr Thomas can offer refer their patients to other places. Cosmetic surgeon Vijay Sharma who opened a fat bank in 2001, had to close it shortly afterward. "I counsel my patients to store away at least 10 ml of their extracted fat.
The Tata Memorial Hospital stores fat for free. However when they run out of space there isn't anywhere else to really turn to." Dr Sharma used to charge Rs 500 per annum for the service. "People are certainly more aware now. There certainly could be scope for a fat bank of sorts," he said.
Other banking costs
Cord Blood -
Storing the umbilical cord stem cells for 21 years is Rs 60,000 or more.
Embryos - Up to Rs 30,000
Photoshopped in real life
Other reconstructive surgeries that may make you blink:
Dimpleplasty: To add super-cute dimples like those modelled by celebrities,
(But remember they are just dents in the skin)
Chin cleft surgery: To get rid of what some call a 'butt chin'
Abdominal etching: Usually for males, liposuction is used to sculpt grooves in layers of fat to suggest a six-pack
Toe shortening: To correct unnatural toe lengths (Think medieval Chinese torture techniques)
Pubic hair transplants: Believe it despite the million hair-removal salons
Belly button surgery: To get rid of that hint of an umbilical cord that refused to let go of you
'Gummy bear' breast transplants: To get the tear drop shapes for your frontal assets
Collagen injections into the feet to make high heels less painful | 
