Forever Young

Created on 24th February 2009

Cosmetic Surgery Magazine UK investigates FAMI, an injection procedure which can rejuvenate the face using the patient’s own tissues

Since its creation more than a decade ago, FAMI has transformed the way physicians and patients approach noninvasive facial rejuvenation by offering a unique alternative to the traditional facelift or blepharoplasty, without scars, general anaesthesia or even a scalpel.

The ageing process

Why is the expression of a twenty years old face always smoother and more harmonious than the same face at forty?

In a young face, the gaze is soft and deep, the smile is serene, and the cheekbones are plump. With ageing, the gaze becomes hard, the eyes seem rounder (protruding eyes), and the nose is more prominent.

The smile reveals more of the gums (gummy smile), the lips are thinner, and the cheekbones are less plump. All of the above contribute to the hardening expression of the face.

At the forehead and eye levels, one can say that ageing causes a slight receding of bone surfaces and an atrophy of the muscles which give the eyes a sad appearance. The eyebrows fall down, the rings under the eyes are deeper and fat pockets appear in the lower eyelid.

In the buccal region, the mouth hexagon moves backward and creates or worsens the nasolabial fold. This backward movement (bone with muscles) of the cheeks and the mouth causes the nose to appear bigger.With ageing, the youthful contours are transformed with sharper angles.

How FAMI tackles the ageing process

By restoring the contours of the face, FAMI recreates the harmonious lines and eliminates the hard expression of the face. The gaze is deeper, the forehead is strengthened, the nose appears smaller, the cheekbones reflect the light more and the lips become fleshy once again. The whole face begains its normal harmonious proportions.

The science behind FAMI

The adult stem cells (from a living person and not from an embryo) are unspecialized cells that can renew themselves indefinitely and, under the right conditions, can develop into more mature cells with specialized functions. Stem cells are the ‘master cells’ that could, in theory, be used to produce virtually any type of replacement mesenchymal tissue for a damaged body (fat, muscle, bone, blood cells).

Liposuction is intended as a cosmetic plastic surgery procedure to rid people of their unwanted fat, but a revolutionary new technique has discovered a way to keep the stem cells from this removed fat and put them to use elsewhere in the body.

Unlike the once-popular fat filler injections promoted in the1980s, FAMI (which stands for Fat Autograft Muscle Injection) offers lasting results based on taking adult stem cells from the lower body fat storage areas mostly the legs) and injecting them into the facial muscle and periosteum, using specialized cannulas adapted to the skull curvatures to create a fuller, more natural and youthful expression.

The possibility of taking years off your face with a non-surgical operation performed in less than three hours is no less than revolutionary and a veritable dream come true for anyone who has ever contemplated ‘going under the knife’.

`The ‘Anatomical Wizard’

A French plastic surgeon, Dr Roger Amar has been using FAMI since 1997 to repair and rejuvenate his patients. According to Dr Amar, “The majority of patients do not need incisional procedures unless they have extremely sagging skin, and only the FAMI technique can fill the need for a total rejuvenation of the skin, muscles and bones.”

The FAMI procedure is simple for the patients – it is performed on an outpatient basis with minimal risk or complications and with downtime ranging from two to ten days – but it represents a challenge for the surgeon. The surgeon needs an expertise in facial micro-anatomy with training on thawed out faces and it is Dr Amar’s exceptional anatomical knowledge, which has earned him the reputation as an ‘Anatomical Wizard’ in medical circles.

Over the years, more than 200 surgeons have travelled to international seminars to personally train under Dr Amar and an estimated 10–15% of he FAMI patients are physicians undergoing the procedure for themselves. What better testimony could a patient ask for?