Base Reduction Narrowing

Our San Diego office gets inquiries all the time from patients wanting to know whether or not they can have isolated nasal base reduction or narrowing. The answer is – yes. In some cases, patients can have only nasal base narrowing surgery, which is often times called a Weir reduction – or alar wedge excision.

The key thing to watch out for is the nasal tip. If someone starts off with a nasal tip that is excessively wide or bulbous, narrowing the nasal base can make the tip look even wider – relatively speaking. In rhinoplasty patients like this, it may be recommended by Dr. Hilinski that you also undergo a tip rhinoplasty procedure at the same time. In addition, isolated Weir incisions are best used when a more moderate amount of nasal base narrowing is going to be performed – as is seen here.

This young lady from the San Diego area consulted with Dr. Hilinski given his reputation as one of San Diego’s best rhinoplasty surgeons. She was hoping to just narrow the base of her nose – meaning she wanted her nostrils to be narrowed on each side. Although her nasal tip wasn’t exactly narrow – Dr. Hilinski felt that he could narrow her nasal base without making her nose tip stick out even more.

Ultimately, this patient underwent the nasal base reduction – sometimes referred to as alar base narrowing – under just local anesthesia in the office setting. Dr. Hilinski cut out a wedge of soft tissue from where the nostril meets the cheek/upper lip region – then sutured the two edges together – thus bringing the nostrils in closer together. She recovered quite nicely with minimal swelling and a quick recovery from the Weir incisions. Here are her before and after photos showing a beautiful cosmetic outcome as a result of the alar base narrowing procedure. And she still looks very natural from the frontal view.