What to Expect: Thread Lift —
Drawn Upright, Placed Line By Line

Your first visit is a consultation with Dr Sin Yong, who examines and treats every patient himself. It usually takes 30–45 minutes, and its first job is to decide whether threads suit your face at all.

He examines you sitting upright and as your face moves, pinches the skin to judge its thickness and recoil, and works out whether a fat pad has descended or deflated. Very thin skin, heavy fat under the skin and established skin excess respond poorly to threads, and threads are avoided in pregnancy, over active skin infection and in people prone to poor healing. If the whole lower face hangs because its deeper support has loosened, the VF Lift – Vertical Facelift may be considered instead. Advanced sagging is a surgical question, and you will be told so.

Tell him about any bleeding tendency, earlier filler, threads or implants, a tendency to keloid scars, planned dental work and the medicines you take. Never stop a prescribed medicine without asking the doctor who prescribed it. Photographs are taken, with your consent, for your medical record only and are never published. You leave with a written plan, and no treatment is always one of the options.

1. Examination. Dr SY confirms the plan and looks at your face again, upright and in motion.
2. Marking. With you sitting up, he draws the anchor points and lines: the direction, starting point and number of each. Midface lines usually run obliquely from the temple towards the cheek fat pad, jawline and jowl lines from in front of the ear, and a brow line anchors at the temple.
3. Choosing the thread. Material and gauge are chosen line by line from PDO, PLLA or PCL, matched to the weight of the tissue and the thickness of your skin.
4. Numbing. A topical anaesthetic goes on at the entry points, then local anaesthetic is placed along each marked line.
5. Placement. A blunt cannula carries each thread along its line into the fat beneath the skin, above the deeper SMAS layer. The cannula is withdrawn, the thread is tensioned towards its anchor so the barbs grip, and the end is trimmed beneath the surface.
6. Checking. Each line is compared with the other side before the next is placed, and both sides are compared again with you seated. Small dimples are smoothed as each thread is finished.
7. Finishing. The entry points are cleaned. They need no stitches or dressings, and you leave with written aftercare.

Any energy treatment or filler in your plan is staged separately, not added on the day.

The local anaesthetic stings briefly as it goes in, with some pressure. Once it has worked, most people feel pressure, movement and a pulling sensation as the cannula passes, rather than sharp pain. You can ask to pause at any point.

In the first hours afterwards your face feels tight, and opening your mouth wide pulls along the thread lines. Tenderness usually lasts a few days. The pain relief that suits you is discussed with Dr SY at your consultation.

What to do on the first day and over the following fortnight is set out in thread lift aftercare.

How you are likely to look, and when work and events can resume, is in thread lift downtime.