Anyone for a Chicago facelift?

With her shiny blonde locks and slender figure, chicklit author-turned-MP Louise Mensch, 40, is undoubtedly something of a babe.

And for a women in mid-life she also displays a fabulously taut jawline and killer cheekbones.

Recently there have even been suggestions that her enviable features might just have had a little help. To be more specific, a procedure that's been dubbed the "Chicago Facelift" that she could have had during the summer Parliamentary recess, which she spent partly in America, where her ex-husband lives.

Speculation about Mensch began when Guardian interviewer Decca Aitkenhead wrote of seeing "incisions in the creases where her ears and cheeks meet that look so fresh... they still have tiny lines of scab".

Intriguingly, Mensch almost admitted that she'd had work done, saying "without denying it, I'm going to refuse to answer your question, because if I did that I'd become the 'minister for mascara'". She added: "My beauty secrets are between me and my various, er, therapists. I'm refusing to answer your question. But you should note that I'm not denying anything."

Indeed, in 2007 Mensch admitted having a cosmetic procedure but refused to say exactly what she'd had done.

So what is the Chicago Facelift? The phrase has Twitter buzzing with speculation and has left surgeons baffled. Consultant plastic surgeon Simon Withey says: "I've certainly never heard of such a thing as a Chicago Facelift. There are self-publicists about who claim they have invented a new way of doing things, but this is definitely not an established or acknowledged technique."

At first, surgeons suggested that Mensch might have had a "silhouette lift". Threads like fine fishing wire are inserted under the skin and used to pull up the face. However, this type of lift leaves tiny incisions hidden in the scalp, not by the ears.

It is more likely that if Mensch has had a mini facelift that has left visible marks it is the type of One-Stitch Lift invented by British consultant plastic surgeon Paul Levick, of the Hospital Group. In this £1,750 procedure, performed under local anaesthetic, a small semicircle of excess skin is cut away where the hair meets the front of the ear. This exposes cheek muscle which is then pulled tight and stitched in place. Then the skin is closed with single running stitch.

This kind of procedure is often done as a pre-Oscar night prep for celebrities who want the kind of preternaturally tight jawlines sported - supposedly entirely naturally - by fortysomething actresses Jennifer Aniston, Demi Moore and Nicole Kidman.

However, this procedure leaves a small scar at the top of the ear rather than in front of it. If there are scars in front of the ears, says Levick, "this sounds more like a traditional, full facelift, which is unusual in a woman of this age with no visible sagging".

Surgeon Simon Withey agrees. "I have seen pictures of Louise Mensch and she does not look like a candidate for a full facelift. Forty is very much on the young side for this procedure, which leaves scars at the front, below and behind the ears."