Belly fat can be incredibly hard to shift, even when you’ve lost weight in other parts of your body. Genetics play a significant part in how our body distributes fat, and unfortunately belly fat is considered one of the most dangerous types of fat. So how can you get rid of it? Anthony Youn, MD, AKA “America’s holistic plastic surgeon”, has great advice for how to target stubborn belly fat without going under the knife. “Several years ago I mentioned on the Rachael Ray Show that the holy grail of plastic surgery is how do you get rid of fat without going under the knife? And the great thing is that we have actually achieved that,” he says. Here’s what Dr. Youn recommends for getting rid of belly fat and keeping it off long-term.
RELATED: 7 Ways to Lose "Unhealthy" Visceral Fat.
CoolSculpting Treatments
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Dr Youn recommends CoolSculpting as a noninvasive method of fat-removal. “There are devices now that doctors use that can actually melt fat noninvasively,” he says. “CoolSculpting is more of the original device where you actually will freeze the fat via an applicator that's put on the surface of the skin. By putting that applicator on the surface of skin, you can chill the fat so much that it crystallizes and some of those fat cells die. Eventually, your body then clears itself of the fat, and then typically after one to two treatments, people can find a reduction in the thickness of fat by about 20%.”
SculpSure Treatments
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Dr. Youn has used SculpSure treatments to treat his own belly fat. “SculpSure is another super popular noninvasive fat reduction treatment, and unlike freezing the fat like CoolSculpting does, SculpSure actually will heat up the fat utilizing a laser to cause those fat cells to die off,” he says. “Now, the results are pretty darn similar as with CoolSculpting, but one big difference is with SculpSure, you can treat up to four different areas all at one time, and that's one reason why this is the treatment that we have in my office in metro Detroit, Michigan. The treatments take about a half hour and they're usually pretty well tolerated, and full disclosure, I actually had it done to my abdomen.”
Kybella Treatments
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“The other option if you've got very small areas of isolated fat pockets (let's say the armpit area), then we can do something called Kybella,” Dr Youn says. “Kybella is an injection of deoxycholic acid, and this is a naturally-occurring substance in our GI tract that actually dissolves away fat, and so that can be injected into smaller areas to help dissolve fat away nonsurgically. Now, Kybella is FDA-approved for reduction of fat in the double chin area, but doctors like myself use it all the time off-label to treat other small areas of fat that can really dissolve away nicely with this treatment.”
RELATED: How to Target Belly Fat With This Simple Diet Change.
Intermittent Fasting
ShutterstockThe fat deep inside your abdomen cannot be removed surgically or non-surgically, but Dr. Youn recommends fasting as a way to target the deep belly fat. “If you've never tried intermittent fasting, or eating in literally an eight hour window for the 24 hour day, that is something that has helped a lot of people target their visceral fat,” he says. “Fasting is a great way to reduce fat, but also to stimulate your stem cells and to improve your longevity. And if you'd like to take intermittent fasting to the next level, then you may want to look into the fasting-mimicking diet. This is a five-day diet where each day you eat a very limited amount of calories, but you trick your body into thinking that it's fasting.”
ReSculpt Sessions
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For women who are dealing with diastasis recti, Dr Youn suggests ReSculpt along with exercises that strengthen abdominal muscles. “This is a device that utilizes electromagnetic energy to stimulate your muscles to contract 20,000 times over a 30 minute session,” he says. “It is absolutely painless. It's a device that literally just is placed right onto your abdomen and it stimulates those muscles to contract. And studies show that after four treatments spaced over two weeks, you can reduce your diastasis by upwards of 11% and you can thicken the muscle by 15% and reduce the fat by 19%.”
