Cosmetic Surgery Articles & Stories

More and more people are seeking minimally invasive cosmetic treatments that can be done in under an hour and have short recovery periods so they won’t jeopardize their jobs, a British plastic surgeon has noted.
   
“The average breast enhancement or facelift can see a person off work for a week or more,” said Ravi Jain, medical director at the Riverbanks Clinic in Bedfordshire, “yet there are a host of other treatments available which can provide similar results with radically shorter recovery times.

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In today’s fast paced world, people are often looking for ways to feel good about themselves while looking as young and beautiful as possible.  Recently, there has been a trend towards all natural treatments and remedies.  This is a great movement and it has extended to many branches of medicine.

There are many natural ways to look and feel younger.  They say that 40 is the new 30.  It is very true that how one feels about themselves often plays a big role in how they act every day.  People that feel good about themselves are generally more poised, confident and less stressed.

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In recent years there has been an explosion of interest in ancient traditions of medicine and healing.  The cumulative wisdom of Chinese, Indian and other Eastern traditions stretches back for thousands of years.  Many of my patients are intrigued but also puzzled by claims of potential health benefits that come from drinking or eating various substances that have the potential to enhance our quality of life.

I have tried to help my patients when they come to me with questions about the benefit and risk of green tea, magnesium supplements and many other traditional substances.  It’s easy enough to do a Medline® search with the name of one of these substances, and out will pop a list of hundreds of studies, some of which claim to show benefit, some of which show no effect, and some of which raise the possibility of harm.  If you take the time to read these studies with a critical eye, it will quickly become apparent that many of the studies are poorly constructed and really don’t show anything.  It’s reminiscent of the debates over coffee, estrogen, and vitamin E.  Last week’s study made me run to the health food shop or the drug store and buy some new miracle food; this week’s study makes me want to throw it away.

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Recent innovations in breast cancer surgery that allow doctors to minimize postsurgical breast deformities may be stressing cosmetic outcomes to the detriment of actual rates of cure, a senior physician warned recently.
   
“We must ensure that surgical approaches designed to improve cosmetic outcomes do not increase local failure and the risk of subsequent death from breast cancer,” said Monica Morrow, chief of the Breast Service at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York. Her editorial was published on the British Medical Journal website.

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The guiding principles of breast cancer have always been to treat the disease first and offer the hope of restoring the body image second. There has never been serious deviation from this standard. 

The cancer surgeon must do what they feel that they need and what they can prove that they need.  Bizarre incisions and overly aggressive breast ablation has no place in the concept of evidence-based medicine.  Likewise, inadequate excision can never be tolerated just because it makes reconstruction easier.

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This study is fascinating: it basically confirms what we all know instinctively. Stress is a huge factor in accelerating aging. Look at how fast President Obama acquired white temples within a 100 days at the Office !

We all age according 3 main mechanisms:

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In this Age of Obesity, more and more people are opting for multiple cosmetic surgery procedures in one sitting.

These so-called "extreme makeovers," which take their name from recent TV shows about plastic surgery, provide a number of benefits to the patient. These include the fact that they are customized to each individua's health situation, total surgical time is shorter, fewer incisions are needed, the overall cost is lowered, and there is only a single recovery period instead of several. ( Read more about "Extreme Makeover" Cosmetic Surgery)

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Product labels for facial fillers that seem to provide a magical reversal of aging and its wrinkles need to be revised to warn of the possibility of the chemicals leaving behind blotches, scars and under-skin bumps, an independent panel told the Food and Drug Administration. "This is almost a no-brainer," said panel member Dr. Michael Bigby, a Harvard Medical School dermatologist. "The current label is not adequate."

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Children with a congenital chest deformity called pectus excavatum, or funnel chest, are routinely self-conscious and ill at ease in the extreme. But after they undergo surgery to correct the defect, their self-concept and social lives improve dramatically. "These results should prompt physicians to consider the physiologic and psychological implications of pectus excavatum just as they would any other physical deformity known to have such consequences," said Robert E. Kelly, of Eastern Virginia Medical School, in Norfolk, Va., and his colleagues in the journal Pediatrics.

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A new technique using adult stem cells from the body's own fat tissue has been found to restore the plumpness, smoothness and skin tightness of a more youthful face. Dr. Vincent Giampapa, who has worked on perfecting the technique during the last four years, introduced the procedure, which rules out the need for surgery or the injection of temporary under-the-skin fillers such as Restylane, Juvederm and hyaluronic acid. The so-called Stem-Cell Facelift also evens out age- or sun-induced facial color differences.

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