The Dangers of Sun Exposure

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In today's world the dangers of sun exposure as they relate to skin cancers and aging of the skin are common knowledge. The aging side of the issue was further supported by a case study published in the April edition of the New England Journal of Medicine. A patient seen at Northwestern Medical Center in Chicago was 66 years old on the right side of his face and 86 years old on the left side.

Nerve Freezing Alternative to Botox

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Botox has been available for decades to treat fine wrinkles on the face but this involves injecting minute amounts of a poison to temporarily paralyze the nerves. An estimated six million doses of botox are now given every year so it is now the single most popular cosmetic treatment in the United States. Now a revolutionary new concept is being developed to replace botox. It involves freezing the nerve so it is temporarily damaged and therefore paralyzed for an equivalent amount of time as the botox injection.

Controlling Pain After Cosmetic Surgery

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Pain control during surgery has been quite good for a number of decades. Refinements in recovery from anesthesia to lower the incidence of nausea, shaking etc. after surgery have been accomplished by adjusting the mix of anesthetics used and employing newer medications like propofol, toradol, zofran etc. More recently the focus has been on controlling pain after surgery to lessen the need for narcotics, shorten recovery times after surgery and improve surgical results in general. The opioid narcotic medications commonly used can become addictive, have small windows between effective and overdosing quantities that affect breathing and tend to be constipating.

Liposuction Can Result in More Fat Around Internal Organs

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Plastic Surgeon researchers at the University of Sao Paulo in Brazil followed 36 normal-weight women who had liposuction to take away a small amount of superficial tummy fat. Beginning 2 months after surgery half of these women were placed on an exercise program (walking on a treadmill and doing light strength training 3 times a week), while the rest stuck with their usual lifestyle. None exercised regularly before surgery.

Four months later the women who did not exercise still had flatter tummies, but they had 10% more fat around the organs inside the abdomen. The women who did exercise had no such gain in this visceral fat. This the the first study showing increases in visceral fat after liposuction if you do not exercise.

Botox, Xeomin and Corporate Espionage

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On Friday, March 9, US District Judge Andrew Guilford entered an injunction against Merz Pharmaceuticals in his Santa Ana, California court chambers. This prohibits Merz from selling filler products or Xeomin or soliciting the purchase of filler products or Xeomin in the facial aesthetic market for 10 months from the date of the order, except in limited circumstances. Merz has to also do a number of other things and report on these to the court in 6 month intervals for the next year in a half. This took place about a week before Merz was supposed to introduce Xeomin, a new direct competitor to Botox, at a major medical meeting in the US.

Treatment of Aging Hands

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As you get older your hands lose fat and muscle volume. The skin develops brown spots (liver spots also know as sun spots), becomes more translucent and shriveled, thins and loses its elasticity. The skin doesn’t bounce back when you pinch it. The underlying veins, tendons and bones then become more visible.

Although we have botox, injectable fillers and facelifts to make our faces look younger as we age the hands frequently look much older than our treated faces. Joan Rivers, no stranger to plastic surgery, suggested to The Huffington Post after Madonna’s recent Super Bowl performance that she favored fingerless gloves because “she’s trying to hide those wrinkly old hands.” Madonna now usually makes public appearances wearing gloves.

Documentary of Plastic Surgeon Volunteer Treatment of Acid Burn Victims Wins Academy Award

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Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy was born in Karachi Pakistan, emigrated to Toronto, Canada and this passed weekend won an academy award here in Los Angeles for her short documentary film Saving Face. The film documents the plight of Pakistani women who are disfigured by having acid poured on them usually by relatives, husbands or rejected suitors. The acid damages the skin, sometimes exposes the underlying bones and often times causes blindness in one or both eyes. The film chronicles the efforts of a Pakistani born British plastic surgeon, Mohammad Jawad,  to reconstruct their faces and restore their dignity. It is the first win for a Pakistani film. A win that instills pride and shame at the same time. Over 100 such attacks occur in Pakistan each year. Most go unreported and the women live secluded lives due to the circumstances surrounding these attacks (in the case of husband attackers they do so out of fear for their children) so the number of victims could even be double that. In the course of the film a girl describes being burned at age 13 for rejecting the advances of her teacher. In the Western world that teacher would have been prosecuted. Although it is rare a female Pakistani lawyer took up the legal case of one of the victims in the film and successfully managed to have the perpetrator convicted. Sadly these women require multiple operations to regain some resemblance of normal appearance. There is a report of a New Delhi India girl who underwent 25 reconstructive operations to treat disfiguring from acid burns.

Woman's Body Swallows Breast Implant

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A report from Johns Hopkins University in the December 2011 New England Journal of Medicine describes the swallowing of a breast implant into a woman's chest cavity. The patient had reconstruction of both breasts after mastectomy for breast cancer. She subsequently had minimally invasive heart surgery via the right mastectomy scar. Some time later while partaking in a Pilates class the right implant was swallowed by her body during a stretching exercise. The intact implant squeezed through a small hole between her ribs left from the heart surgery and ended up on top of her right diaphragm. It must have been scary to look down and see the implant disappear into her chest.

The implant was retrieved, the hole in the chest was closed with a mesh patch and the implant was put back in its original position. Now I assume she is back doing Pilates. This is one thing you don't see everyday.

Aaron Stone MD - Plastic Surgeon Los Angeles
Aaron Stone MD - twitter

Home Laser and Cosmetic Devices

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A Google search on "home laser" yielded 154,000,000 website links overseas and 48,000,000 when searched in the US. Most of the initial listings are for hair removal devices but there are also ones for treating acne and for facial rejuvenation and others treat skin conditions like psoriasis, vitiligo and dermatitis. Many of these home laser and light or ultrasonic devices can be purchased on the Internet. Sellers tout the benefits of these products in treating acne, age spots, large pores, wrinkles, sagging skin, puffy eyes, rosacea, cold sores, and many other skin conditions. However, few of the devices have been studied or approved by the Food and Drug Administration. Some of them sound sort of scary and could be a waste of money or at worst harmful. Sales of home cosmetic devices totaled $500 million last year, and are expected to nearly double to $950 million in 2015. Women have been removing hair from their legs for quite some time. Now it is a multibillion dollar per year industry.

Slap Your Way to Larger Breasts

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35 year old Bangkok, Thailand beautician Khemmika Na Songkhla also known as Khunying Tobnom claims to be able to enlarge your breasts without surgery—by slapping them. Her grandmother mocked her for wasting time rubbing her nipples with a miracle cream when she was in her early teens in hopes of sprouting big breasts. Her grandmother then advised her to rub them till they hurt and repeatedly push fat from her sides and abdomen towards her chest, and then douse the breasts with ice water. She claims that by following her grandmother's advice she boosted her breast size by 4inches and her confidence soared. Ms Khemmikka says that by using this non-surgical technique (squeezing, pinching and slapping fat and muscle on the upper chest, the sides of the torso, and the belly of clients with cream or gel for an hour over six 10-minute sessions for a total cost of $380) she has enlarged the breasts up to 4 inches in thousands of Thai women over the past 14 years without injections, chemicals or implants. After the treatment Khemmika instructs her customers in special exercise techniques and massage to keep their breasts in shape.