What Happens to Surrounding Skin After the Strip is Removed?

Dr. Rassman,

I know that this question is probably answered in many FAQs, but I’ve been watching your blog for two years straight and do not recall seeing it:

What happens to the surrounding skin when you cut out the donor area? I’m particularly concerned with knowing exactly which areas of skin are going to get “stretched” to make up for the missing skin. For example, does my face get tighter? Does my neck feel tighter? Does the skin regenerate to compensate? Can this lead to minor sagging/stretch marks in areas behind the head? More importantly, can it shift parts of your face slightly out of line?

This is a great question, one that I am asked when I do consultations. Your face doesn’t get tight, your neck isn’t stiff. You don’t even get tighter buns. The stretch that occurs is so uniform that most of the time there’s nothing that can be detected. Some people who have good laxity will notice a slight decrease in the looseness of their scalp.

I only wished that my own strip excision would’ve produced even a small face lift, but the answer is that there is really no shift of anything. I dream of doing a hair transplant and giving a person a facelift, which would allow me to increase my fees and offer more value, but alas this does not happen.