Can Fat Grafts Migrate Like Filler?

Fat grafting is a procedure in which we harvest fat from an area with a little extra (usually the abdomen or waist) and delicately inject the fat to add volume or structure to another location (more details here). Often fat grafting is used as a substitute for filler. Most fillers are temporary (lasting from a few months to a couple years) and can in some cases migrate away from the injection site. Fat grafts can provide long-lasting volume, but some transferred fat is reabsorbed and the amount that remains varies from patient to patient. The reason is that the fat cells attach to local tissue and receive a new blood supply from blood vessels in the recipient site. The fat graft actually becomes part of the anatomy in its new location and will not migrate from the injection site.