Plastic surgery of the abdomen can accomplish many things that you cannot accomplish on your own – no matter how much you diet and work out. Dieting and working out may tone your muscles and help you lose weight, but they will not tighten your loose skin, nor will they tighten your loose inner girdle. A tummy tuck can give you a flat stomach by tightening your inner girdle. It also removes loose skin of your lower abdomen and tightens the skin of your upper abdomen.

Abdominoplasty can also remove nearly all the fat of your lower abdomen as well as the
stretch marks. In fact, there is practically nothing that pregnancy can do to your abdomen that a tummy tuck can’t improve.

Abdominoplasty does have limitations. It will not remove stretch marks of your mid or upper abdomen (but it will shift them lower on your abdomen). If you have a thick layer of fat in your upper abdomen, an abdominoplasty will not reduce its thickness. If you want lipo for this, you may be out of luck. Aggressive liposuction of the upper abdomen at the same time is ill-advised because it can interfere with circulation and cause complications.

If your fat is very very thick, you may be advised by your plastic surgeon to avoid a tummy tuck completely because of a high risk of healing problems. In this case, you may be offered a panniculectomy, which involves removal of skin and fat only, with no tightening of your inner girdle (fascia).