The latest cosmetic craze: Bum lift!

Constantino Mendieta is the inventor of the Miami Thong Lift, the latest way to a shapelier rear view. According to Mendieta, a Harvard-educated surgeon, there's been a steady rise in numbers of women seeking a curvier bottom, like that of Miami's famous resident J-Lo.

However, top-notch plastic surgeon Rajiv Grover explained that these operations could be risky.

Previously, the standard way to create a rounder, higher bottom was with silicone implants, similar to those used for breast enlargement.

"Implants have a tendency to move and, if they get infected, they have to be surgically removed," The Daily Mail quoted Grover as saying.

So, Mendieta uses grafts of fat liposuctioned from the thighs or stomach, purified and then painstakingly injected ufffd using a large needle ufffd into the layers of muscle of the buttocks, changing their shape from flat to super-curvy and high. Because the fat belongs to the patient, there is no risk of rejection.

The scars left by the incisions needed to inject the fat are hidden, said Mendieta, 'in the grand canyon where the thong goes', hence the name of the procedure.

However, he warns that the procedure isn't entirely risk-free.

"It needs to be done by a very experienced surgeon, in a hospital, in sterile conditions with good aftercare ufffd if you get an infection it could cause a very large abscess," said Mendieta.

Also, fat transfer is never 100 per cent predictable. If the fat dies and is re-absorbed by the body unevenly, you could end up with one buttock larger than the other. To say nothing of the bruising and swelling that can last for months.

Added to the risk, the cost is quite high too - 8,850 pounds.