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Plastic Surgeon Outlines Ten Things You Should Know About Tummy Tucks

Tummy Tuck surgery is almost invariably greatly appreciated by the proper patient. These top ten facts might help you figure if you are such a person. ;)

(1) Tummy Tuck surgery is one of the largest scale operations a plastic surgeon can offer a patient.

(2) Patients who have lost a good deal of weight or completed child bearing involving large weight gain and loss are the most common candidates. Patients do not lose much weight from the operation itself in most cases….maybe a few pounds on average.

(3) Post-operative pain used to make it necessary to admit the patient to a hospital for narcotics.

(4) Pain pumps when properly utilized can Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at Truth in Cosmetic Surgery*

Will A Tax On Breast Implants In The UK Drive People Away?

The British HM Revenue and Customs is planning to impose a tax on cosmetic surgeries by slapping VAT on any artificial enhancements and procedures. According to the new guidelines by the department responsible for collecting UK’s taxes, doctors performing more invasive procedures will have to register for VAT and pass the charge on to their patients. The guidelines suggest that patients having such cosmetic procedures will have to pay the tax unless they can persuade the doctor that the operation is being carried out for “therapeutic” reasons. Although the move is being considered to help plug the deficit in Britain’s public finances, but Fazel Fatah, president of the British Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons (BAAPS), said that this could harm many patients.
Source: dnaindia.com/lifestyle/report_boob-tax-to-increase-cost-of-cosmetic-surgery-by-20-per-cent_1599777

The government in the UK seeks to hasten the movement of cosmetic surgery business out of the country it seems. That will likely be the effect of the planned extension of the VAT tax to cosmetic surgery. It is already less expensive for British citizens to leave the country for their cosmetic surgery. The care in most cases is not equivalent. The reason to consider it just got 20% more persuasive however. That is a huge tax!

Here in the US, Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at Truth in Cosmetic Surgery*

Will Insurance Cover A Mole Removal?

In years gone by, I spent far too much time removing small skin bumps in the office. At the time, I was sharing space with another doctor who was profiting by any service I provided. His staff scheduled me with tons of things that simply made me no money. [Meanwhile his stuff diverted some of my better business into his schedule as opposed to mine.]

The facts of life are that medicine is a business and when I am paying a huge chunk of change to overhead, I need to make that back or I operate at a loss.

Patients frequently don’t understand why I cannot remove their moles for what their insurance pays and make a profit. Well, Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at Truth in Cosmetic Surgery*

Can Major Scarring Be Avoided With Breast Lift Surgery?

Breast Lift surgery (Mastopexy) is obviously surgery to lift the breast. There are variations of this operation – quite a few variations. Breast lift operations are usually discussed relative to the “full breast lift” which has also been called the anchor lift. This operation leaves scars around the areola, under the breast and vertically between the two. The shape of the scar configuration resembles an anchor, hence the name. The potential for scars is one of the major concerns potential patients have with the surgery. This version of the operation also has the greatest potential to change the shape of the breast.

Reduced scar breast lifts came into creation to limit the potential for scarring. The important compromise, however, is that these modified breast lifts “lift” less. Reduced scar lifts can involve any portion of the full lift scar pattern. The modified lift with an incision above the areola only is called a “Crescent lift.” It provides only Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at Truth in Cosmetic Surgery*

Why Do Newer Liposuction Techniques Leave The Skin Sagging?

The ladies in this story have had a “new” form of lipo instead of a tummy tuck. Their stomachs do look thinner but their skin in wrinkly. Would they have been better served by having a tummy tuck and then lipo? Is it just their age that has their skin looking that way?

Source: dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1215196/
New-5-000-treatment-claims-melt-away-muffin-top.html

VASER liposuction has been around for a while. I have used it and it is effective. The main question with newer lipo technologies is: “Are they worth the added expense and can they increase problems?”

Many of them (VASER included) make it even easier to take out more and more fat. As we have discussed here before of course more fat removal is not always desirable. Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at Truth in Cosmetic Surgery*

Latest Interviews

IDEA Labs: Medical Students Take The Lead In Healthcare Innovation

It’s no secret that doctors are disappointed with the way that the U.S. healthcare system is evolving. Most feel helpless about improving their work conditions or solving technical problems in patient care. Fortunately one young medical student was undeterred by the mountain of disappointment carried by his senior clinician mentors…

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How To Be A Successful Patient: Young Doctors Offer Some Advice

I am proud to be a part of the American Resident Project an initiative that promotes the writing of medical students residents and new physicians as they explore ideas for transforming American health care delivery. I recently had the opportunity to interview three of the writing fellows about how to…

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Latest Book Reviews

Book Review: Is Empathy Learned By Faking It Till It’s Real?

I m often asked to do book reviews on my blog and I rarely agree to them. This is because it takes me a long time to read a book and then if I don t enjoy it I figure the author would rather me remain silent than publish my…

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The Spirit Of The Place: Samuel Shem’s New Book May Depress You

When I was in medical school I read Samuel Shem s House Of God as a right of passage. At the time I found it to be a cynical yet eerily accurate portrayal of the underbelly of academic medicine. I gained comfort from its gallows humor and it made me…

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Eat To Save Your Life: Another Half-True Diet Book

I am hesitant to review diet books because they are so often a tangled mess of fact and fiction. Teasing out their truth from falsehood is about as exhausting as delousing a long-haired elementary school student. However after being approached by the authors’ PR agency with the promise of a…

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