Cleft Earlobe/Earlobe Lift Gallery

An RN in her late 50’s with a partial cleft of her left earlobe. Her earrings “hang funny” now and fall out. She is shone before and again, 3 months after an earlobe lift/ repair. In the ear lobe lift, a wedge of ear lobe is precisely measured and removed to elevate the droopy ear lobe at the time of repair.

A woman in her late 30’s with a partial cleft of her left ear lobe. Her earrings now hang funny and start to fall out. She is shown before and again, 3 months after repair.
Discussion: She attributes the partial tear to the use of her cell phone on this side. Scars are typically at the reddest and thickest at 6 weeks and then continue to fade for the next 2 years. We will re=pierce the ears at the 3 month mark in the office, and recommend that our patients cleanse the area with hydrogen peroxide 2-3x day for the following 3-4 weeks and then start to remove the earring(s) when sleeping to prevent re-tearing of the earlobe from the friction of the earring against the pillow.

An early ( 6 week) follow-up on a man in his mid to late 30’s with gauges in his ears. He does not like the look of gauges any longer and wanted to have these corrected. The scars are typically at their reddest at 6 weeks and will now fade and improve over the next 2 years. He is thrilled with the appearance, and happy to have “normal” ears again.

Update: Our patient is now seen nearly 6 months after his gauges repair. The scars have continued to fade, and the earlobes have a normal shape.

A woman in her mid 20’s who has had problems with a left torn earlobe. She started having problems with developing small tears which eventually tore through while in college and had had this repaired 4 years ago. She did well for about a year but then it tore again. It is good to fix a problem but even better to prevent a problem. The issue here: probably from wearing earrings while sleeping. This seems to be more of a problem in my patients with relatively short ear lobes as we have here. My theory is that the earring post levers back and forth on the pillow and against the ear cartilage and cuts through the earlobe like a wire cutting through a block of cheese. She is shown before and again, 15 months after repair by us in the office. We have re-pierced her ear for her in the office. After cleansing with hydrogen peroxide 2-3 times a day for the next 3-4 weeks she will start to remove the earrings while sleeping.

A man in his late 30’s who felt that his gauges no longer represented the image of himself that he wanted to present to the world. He is shown before an 8 weeks after correction of his gauges in the office under local anesthesia. Although scars are typically at their reddest and thickest at 6 weeks and then begin to settle over the next year, he is already thrilled with the normal appearance of his ears.

A woman in her early 40’s who is bothered by the stretching of her earlobe and earlobe piercing. Her earrings “hang funny” and the earlobes appear droopy. She is shown before and again, 3 months after a bilateral earlobe lift. A wedge is carefully marked by swinging the earlobe back and forth past an imaginary point. This corrects the drooping of the earlobe. She was so happy when we re-pierced her ears in the office that she said that she felt like she was in 7th grade again and getting her ears pierced for the first time!

A man in his mid 40’s with a deformity of his left ear lobe. He had had chronic infection of a cyst of his left ear 2 years before which had drained on its own, but left him with an unusual prominence of his earlobe. He had thickening of the lobe without a true residual cyst. He is shown before and again, 7 months after correction in the office with a wedge resection of the ear. Although scars will typically continue to fade and improve for 2 years or longer, he is already thrilled with the correction of his ear lobe which now appears normal.

An 11 year-old girl with a torn right earlobe from 2 years earlier. She is shown just before and again, 3 months after repair in the office under local anesthesia.

A woman in her late 60’s who has a cleft of her right ear. She is shown before and again, 3 months after repair in the office.

A woman in her late 30’s who is bothered by a cleft earlobe on one side, probably from wearing her earrings while sleeping. She is shown before and again, 4 months after repair.