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The marketplace is exploding with practitioners offering cosmetic services. Several factors come into play: pressure from government medicine and increasingly restrictive insurance companies; the availability of effective, minimally invasive procedures to make improvements; and the general lack of regulation.
The result is a boom in practitioners who are minimally trained, minimally experienced and minimally motivated other than by the dollars involved. Television, internet and other media sources are loaded with enticing, come-on ads. How is a person to know where to go?
Board-certified plastic surgeons often see the disasters that can result from these so-called "safe procedures.” Even Botox, often considered one of the safest procedures in medicine, can be tricky. It is not uncommon to have to tweak the results because of uneven distribution of the injection or other causes. Fortunately the effects of Botox are short lived, approximately three to four months.
One such disaster involved an injection by a “friend" of a substance to plump the cheeks. The unfortunate result was a rampaging infection that required months of intravenous antibiotics and extensive surgery. The patient was still left with distorting facial scars. The procedure apparently was done outside of a medical facility by someone who was untrained and unlicensed, with a substance that probably was unauthorized. While the services and products from a reliable provider may seem expensive, one can hardly imagine the cost, both financially and emotionally, of having to go through an experience like this.
Some of these procedures are done by physicians competent in their own field who have wandered outside their specialty and claim to be plastic surgeons. Their main qualification is the ad that they run.
First of all, look at the practitioner’s training. Training has to be the foundation by which every practitioner builds a practice. Board certification in plastic surgery requires years of preparation, including extensive cosmetic surgery as well as reconstructive surgery. As a plastic surgeon, I spent nine years training after medical school. Yet some practitioners “learn” procedures in a training session that lasts only a few hours and is sponsored by the companies that make the product. Yet few people ask the practitioner, “Where did you learn to do this procedure?”
Also, consider experience when choosing a practitioner. Is the treatment a sideline to the regular practice of gynecology, urology or some "cosmetically oriented" specialty practice? And beware that the companies that produce and market cosmetic injectables are required to sell these to any physician, dentist or other practitioner who orders them. Finally, always ask whether the salon is really supervised by the physician whose name is on the door. If not, it may be just a shadow operation.
The bottom line in choosing a practitioner is: “Caveat Emptor.” Let the buyer beware. Do your homework before you trust your face to a "Michael Angelo" or a “Freddy Kruger.”
Dr. Richard Gregory is a board-certified plastic surgeon and a graduate of the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md. A recognized author and international lecturer, he received his medical degree from the Indiana University School of Medicine and completed his general surgery and plastic surgery residencies at Duke University Medical Center. He has conducted numerous mission trips to Central and South America to help reconstruct injured and congenitally deformed children. Service to God, his family and his patients is what drives Dr. Gregory. He has offices in Celebration, Altamonte Springs and The Villages.
