“Exercise vs. Liposuction: Which One Targets the Fat?” by Dr. Castellano
by Dr. Joseph Castellano
It’s a well-known fact that getting a lot better about what you’re eating and sticking to a regular workout routine are your best options when it comes to shedding those extra pounds. Yet, it’s also pretty well-known that liposuction can greatly help men and women improve their body shape. Between exercise and lipo, which one better targets the fat?
How fat is accumulated?
At the most basic level, weight gain occurs when calorie intake outpaces the amount of energy put forth on a consistent basis.
- Eating a lot of high-calorie junk foods combined with a very sedentary lifestyle adds up to a body that’s overweight and out of shape.
- Without regular exercise, the body isn’t burning off extra calories fast enough to prevent fat stores, let alone using up the ones that are there already fast enough for effective weight maintenance.
Typically, the fat that contributes to pounds on the scale is visceral fat. Present in everyone, this fat provides a necessary cushion around the internal organs. However, when the fat cells expand in response to all those extra calories, the resulting buildup can lead to serious health concerns including disruptions in metabolism as well as being at higher risk for heart disease or diabetes.
How Exercise works in terms of fat loss?
The combination of exercise and dietary changes is often the best approach to losing excess weight.
- The intake of extra calories is eliminated by changing eating habits.
- Existing fat stores are eliminated when activity levels increase.
Now, which is a great approach by means of exercise in order to eradicate fat? According to the specialist a proper combination of cardio training along with strength building exercises is ideal in terms of fat loss. A few really efficient fat burning exercises can be found here!
How Liposuction Affects Fat
Despite the undeniable improvements that can be gained through diet and exercise, if that approach alone worked to achieve the ideal body shape, then liposuction would be rendered irrelevant. Since that’s clearly not the case, what is it that lipo does differently from either diet or exercise?
The answer lies in looking at the other type of fat the body produces, which is called subcutaneous fat:
- When fat cells just below the skin expand, they cause pudgy spots that are present even after reaching a healthy target weight.
- Although both visceral and subcutaneous fat can be reduced through diet and exercise, subcutaneous fat is not removed as easily.
- Liposuction eliminates exactly these subcutaneous fat cells that other methods may not impact.
The presence of subcutaneous fat can be tested with a simple pinch. If the skin is hard to grab, then the appearance of a bulge in that area is likely visceral fat. However, easily pinching an inch or two indicates the problem is due to subcutaneous fat instead. Subcutaneous fat is most visible around the belly, through the love handles and flanks, and also in the upper arms and the thighs.
Combining Liposuction and Exercise
The best thing about liposuction and exercise is that both address essential aspects of achieving the ideal body shape in completely different ways, which makes them very complementary procedures. It’s not uncommon to focus first on reaching a healthy target weight through dietary changes and the help of a personal trainer, and then incorporating liposuction once that goal has been maintained for several months.
The question of whether exercise or liposuction targets fat really has one simple answer: both accomplish that goal, yet from different directions. Lipo can’t help patients lose weight, and exercise can’t always eliminate the appearance of fat. Combining the two is the ideal solution for comprehensive results.
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