1. A 32 year old Toronto woman dies after having liposuction performed by a family physician/cosmetic surgeon. This is an unfortunate reminder that there are too many non-plastic surgeons who are performing plastic surgery without informing their patients of their lack of training and credentials. A cosmetic surgeon is not the same as a plastic surgeon. Click here for the article. Click here for my website page on how to choose a plastic surgeon.
2. Heidi Montag confirms that she's had a breast augmentation and rhinoplasty. Really? I didn't notice. Click here.
3. The Australian navy spent over $1.1 million for aesthetic plastic surgery (tummy tucks, breast augmentation, etc.) on its service personnel. I've heard stories about this with the U.S. military too, but have no concrete information on it. On a not-quite-so-related note, did you know that Medicare pays for penile implants for old men with erectile dysfunction? We have people living on the streets and children going without proper health care, and our tax dollars pay for this? Sigh. Click here.
Photo credit: prphotos.com
Thanks for reading.
Michigan-based Plastic Surgeon
Anthony Youn, M.D.:
Military hospitals are often teaching hospitals. Military plastic surgeons need time in the saddle doing cosmetic procedures as well as repairing traumatic wounds and birth defects. There is nothing wrong or wasteful about this as long as it is done on a space available basis and implants are paid for by the patient.
ReplyDeleteso liposuction is not safe huh?
ReplyDeleteSo Medicare (insurance you've earned in one way or another) shouldn't pay for a grown man who has "paid the price" for this insurance to continue to have a fulfilling sex life, but we should "sigh" that younger people wish to live off the government and not "pay for it one way or another" to be fully insured? Technicality in "government funded" for sure.
ReplyDeleteAnonymous above,
ReplyDeleteSo little kids should be punished for the laziness of the parents while so old men get penile implants so they can still get laid when they are 80? Call me crazy but one child's heath is more important than some old dude's sex life. No matter who pays for it. And by the way, learn how to properly use quotation marks.
recently a general practitioner in my country was restricted after one of his lipo patients died. he did the procedure and sent her home. he then ignored the many calls by the patient's daughter describing what was essentially slow exsanguination until she was dead.
ReplyDeletebut i can't help thinking that if you take the chance of having these type of operations by not properly qualified people, you're taking a chance and you shouldn't complain too much when things turn sour.
I can't get my keywords right to find the story from a few years back about a military man convicted of pedophilia getting a penile implant, paid for by US taxpayers.
ReplyDeleteS
Anon 11:07.
ReplyDeleteYou are sick, and selfish.
Get a heart transplant.
Oh, sorry, right, you must think that REALLY being pro-healthy children is only what whiny, heart bleeding liberals care about. That's whats funny about conservative values, love the zygote/fetus/blastocyst, hate the actual living breathing child.
Jake
Why do you need to post your name under every entry? We know it is you Dr.
ReplyDeleteIf military doctors are performing these surgeries it is obviously to give the doctors practise time with reconstruction surgery.
Having experience caring for patients in military facilities undergoing plastic surgery procedures...would you deny a breast cancer survivor the benefit of having reconstructive surgery? What many of these media stories ignore is that military dependents are also entitled to care at military hospitals. Additionally, active duty patients are required to obtain permission from their commanding officers in order to undergo these procedures, and surgery is not something to be entered into lightly.
ReplyDeleteAdditionally, military surgeons often require a certain number of hours in order to attain (or maintain) board certification and this is also required for promotion and to be competitive for duty assignments.
Should you feel plastic surgery is a specialty not needed by the military, you can probably take it up with the many war veterans who have been disfigured by IEDs and horrific burns. Military surgeons are also noted for performing humanitarian surgeries for civilians.
I don't think that anyone has a problem with reconstructive plastic surgery. Aesthetic plastic surgery is, however, controversial.
ReplyDeleteTwo of my girlfriends got their implants done at a military hospital. They were both married to soldiers. However, I don't remember whether they paid or not -I don't recall either one discussing the cost.
ReplyDeleteThis was in the nineties. Things may have changed.