Still in its infancy, rib remodeling was “designed to be minimally invasive and far safer than rib removal surgery,” says Dr. Hadeed, “offering an effective option for people who want to fine-tune their natural shape and aren’t looking for a drastic alteration in their waistline.”

Jennifer, 37, a business owner in San Diego, had rib remodeling surgery with Dr. Hadeed in November 2024. “I went from a 28-inch waist to a size 25 waist and feel so much happier with my body,” she says. Numi, 33, who’s about four months out from rib remodeling with Dr. Turin, says her body has taken various shapes over the years, but whether she was skinny or heavier or more muscular, “my silhouette remained straight,” she says. Rib remodeling shaved five inches off her waistline. “I feel more feminine and genuinely more aligned with how I’ve always envisioned myself,” she says. “Clothes fit better—they compliment my shape more naturally—and I no longer feel the need to ‘create’ curves with styling tricks.”

Knowing that rib remodeling is “still a relatively new procedure,” Numi did her due diligence before committing. “There aren’t many firsthand patient experiences out there, but I did as much research as I could, reading through medical explanations from multiple surgeons, watching videos where doctors detail their methods, and digging through Reddit threads where a few patients shared their journeys,” she says. Ultimately, she felt confident in the safety of the operation. “Choosing a qualified doctor made all the difference,” she says.

While the procedure “is entering a heyday and many more [doctors] are performing it, there is real risk,” notes Daniel J. Gould, MD, a board-certified plastic surgeon in Beverly Hills. He tells me that there’s a surgeon who does rib remodeling at one of the ORs he works in, and the anesthesia team refuses to staff those cases due to safety concerns. “It may become safer with time, but I can’t imagine doing that surgery just to make the waist a little bit smaller. I looked into it three years ago when Colombian surgeons started offering it as the ‘Barbie waist.’ I feel like it’s hard to offer it, even if it is safe, because ultimately it feeds into the alienization of bodies.” (In aesthetics, alienization refers to the distortion of the face or body in ways that are uncanny or beyond the realm of normal anatomy.) At the same time, Dr. Gould is quick to acknowledge the elective nature of cosmetic surgery: “I don’t want to appear hypocritical—we all do surgeries that no one needs.” And while one procedure may be more socially acceptable than another, none is without risk.

Based on an unofficial review of the literature (a skimming of studies I sent his way), Steven Teitelbaum, MD, a board-certified plastic surgeon in Santa Monica, also has reservations about rib remodeling—regarding both the aesthetic it can create and its uncertain safety profile. “I believe people should have the freedom to choose the body they want, but I think plastic surgeons should only allow that to be within the realm of what a human body can actually look like,” he says. To his eye, the results of rib removal and remodeling can sometimes make patients look “exceedingly cartoonish” or even “like insects,” he says, particularly when the indentation is “too severe and abrupt” or falls in the wrong place, “narrowing people above where the narrowest part of the waist should be.”

Who’s a candidate for rib remodeling?

According to my sources, patients seeking cosmetic rib surgery are typically athletic women with square or straight torsos, who want to adjust their waist-to-hip ratio, but lack the fat needed for more mainstream contouring procedures, like liposuction and fat grafting. “If there’s not a lot of fat [in the midriff] to be removed, then I can’t do lipo to carve a waist or redistribute that fat to the hips,” says Dr. Turin. “If someone is very lean and wants an hourglass figure, rib remodeling is pretty much the only operation that’s going to produce that for them.” Dr. Turin says that over the past few months he’s performed about seven rib remodeling procedures. Looking ahead, he has one scheduled every two to three weeks through the summer—all word-of-mouth referrals, he says.