What To Expect During a Plastic Surgery Consultation

Before booking any sort of plastic surgery procedure, one must first have a consultation (or two) with their surgeon. A consultation is your one-on-one “getting to know you” time with your doctor. To get the most of your cosmetic surgery consultation, use your time wisely. Ask questions, come prepared, and get to know your surgeon. Dr. Stephanides offers complimentary consultations. He enjoys getting to know his patients and giving them a chance to know him.

 

We often get asked “what should I expect during my first consultation?”, and this is a perfect opportunity to answer that question for you!

What will happen during the consultation?

Dr. Stephanides will spend the consultation giving you a better understanding of the surgery in which you are interested. He will go over how the surgery is performed, the differences among the techniques, and what is the best surgical option for you. Dr. Stephanides will also give you information about the facility he operates at in Nashville,Tennessee.

 

After your time with the doctor is complete, a member of his team will go over the pricing and payment options the office offers, and let you know how to proceed if you wish to come in for another consultation or book surgery. There is no pressure to book a surgery during the consultation. Dr. Stephanides wants his patents to feel comfortable, prepared and well informed before surgery and that’s what the consultation is all about.

What should I bring with me?

 

Our office does not require you to bring anything specific with to your consultation. However, it is helpful to bring a list of medications you are taking and drug allergies that you are aware of. If you have specific questions, feel free to write them down and bring them with you. It is perfectly okay with us, if you would like to bring a friend, partner, or spouse with you to your consultation.

What questions should I ask the doctor?

Dr. Stephanides will do his best to answer any questions about the surgery, pre-op, post-op and everything in between. However, as with any plastic surgeon, there are always a few questions that are important to ask:

Are you board certified?

Is the doctor familiar with this type of surgery?

What type of anesthesia will I receive?

What will my recovery be like?

Am I a good candidate for this procedure?

How long will the consultation last?

Dr. Stephanides does not like to keep his patients waiting. Expect to be brought back within minutes of your arrival. The consultations last about an hour. The time may be shorter or a bit longer depending on the depth of the procedure. Do not worry about feeling rushed. If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to ask the doctor. You are his number one priority and he wants you to feel satisfied and at ease when you leave your consultation.

Have any more questions for the doctor? Be sure to let us know in the comments!

IS IT A MATTER OF SEASONS?

I was at a restaurant the other day and there were four guys sitting at the table right next to ours.  They were talking about soccer teams, for what seemed like all night!  I was not eavesdropping on their conversation but they were pretty loud. It was unbelievable.  Like nothing else mattered in the world.  We were at the restaurant for about 3 hours enjoying our meal, and the guys were … well, all about football.  The US team did this, and the Brazilian team did that, and what about so and so player playing in the Argentinian team and so forth.

The next day I went to have my nails done and all the TV screens in the room were showing the “Germany-France” game.  And that’s when it hit me!  There is a soccer season, a basketball season, a strawberry-picking season … is there a season for plastic surgeries?

It would seem that there is not, as people have plastic surgeries done throughout the year and wherever you go, whichever party or gathering you go to, there is always someone talking about plastic surgery.  But I could not leave my question unanswered and rest assured with this vagueness.  So I researched it!

And voila! Yes, there is seasonality in plastic surgery.  Not in terms of whether one visits the plastic surgeon or not, but instead it is a matter of which procedures are performed at particular seasons.  It was fascinating and exiting to see that.  I had never thought about it before.

So when is the best time of the year to have a surgery performed? 

Well, it seems that during the spring, and especially between April and June, breast augmentation, body contouring, tummy tuck and liposuction are the procedures of choice.  Reason being that we start thinking about the horrifying time of putting a swimsuit on! And of course when we do go ahead to try the ones from the year before, seeing the extra fat that was not there last year, gets us panicky and off we go to the plastic surgeon to take care of that.  Needless to say that we realize that we would look so much better if we actually fill the top part of the bathing suit and ask for breast augmentation as well.  Of course, if we are at the stage of our life when everything goes south and gravity takes over, then we might throw a breast lift in the menu as well.

The summer, meaning July and August, is a bit slower and only minor procedures are performed … however this also depends on our vacation time, because we could utilize that period for recovery, without having to take time off work.  It will also depend on when we actually schedule our holidays because if we actually plan them for the beginning of the summer, then we might as well have our procedures done right after we get back.

The fall, which in plastic surgery terms runs from September through December, is the preferred time to have facial surgery, ranging from a facelift, to blepharoplasty or rhinoplasty.  Wearing scarves or using heavier makeup is easier when it’s colder, than in the middle of summer when the temperatures are ski rocketing. Having said that, procedures such as breast augmentation, liposuction, tummy tuck and mastopexy are not excluded from this period. It is a great time for these type of procedures too, as this gives enough time for all swelling to go down and for the final result of surgery to be eminent … and all this for the next bathing suit season! Plus bandages and dressings can be covered up much easier in layers of clothes and sweaters than tank tops and shorts, which are warn in the warmer months.

Naturally the week between Christmas and New Years could be perfectly used for any procedure and its recovery, so instead of going skiing in Denver you might as well use that time off work to have just about any type of plastic surgery.  Mid December through March is really the “all procedures go” time of the year. 

             Whichever time period you choose, just make sure you give yourself enough time to recover.  Your board certified plastic surgeon will be able to give you exact recovery times and what to expect at any given time post your surgery.  So act accordingly and plan ahead.

THE ART OF CHANGING WITH EXPERIENCE

My grandmother used to tell me that there are only two kinds of people who don’t change their opinion, and these are the crazy and the dead!!! Being a kid and totally inexperienced with life when she was telling me this, I couldn’t really realize what she was saying and what she meant.  But as I was growing up and I was adding experiences in my bag of knowledge I could only kneel to her grand and wise words. 

These words of hers came to mind again last week when I was talking with Dr. Stephanides about the various procedures performed at our office.  I was basically asking him what distinguishes a plastic surgeon from the next one down the street, or in a different state.  It seemed to me that a liposuction is a liposuction and a facelift a facelift from whichever angle you look at it.  And that’s when he started talking and opening up to all that he calls: “aces in his sleeve”.

He was basically explaining how he had done certain operations when he started off at Stanford University Medical Center, so many years ago, but that the procedures, with the “same name,” are now different.  Not meaning that a liposuction is no longer a liposuction … not at all.  What he was really saying is that plastic surgery is really a form of art, an evolution, and the surgeons get better and better with each time they go in the operating room.  A surgeon who loves what he does and is devoted to his patients will dedicate his life to improving each technique, both for the sake of the procedure itself, making it easier, smoother, safer and more efficient, but also for the sake of the patients, making the operations less painful, with a shorter down time and improved results.

I thought that this was really a natural process of progression in any profession … I couldn’t be more wrong!  Dr. Stephanides told me, and I must admit that at the end of our conversation I was utterly convinced, that since the goal of each plastic surgery procedure is to get the best possible results with the highest patient satisfaction, a surgeon needs to be flexible enough to tweak the traditional methodology in such a way as to raise the level of patient gratification and procedure outcome. He also said that of course there is a fine line between tweaking for improvement purposes and modifying so much that it actually becomes experimentation. 

Dr. Stephanides said that the traditional methods are wonderful, as a basis for starting with operations, but as knowledge accumulates over the years, each surgeon must tender to the needs of each individual patient and even though sticking to the traditional methods found in every plastic surgery textbook is safe, it seems that simply bringing “average” results is not the ultimate conclusion.  Flexibility is a must and being rigid to certain ways for the sake of the traditional methods is not desirable, for this will not bring ideal results.

             Summing up, it seems to me that the best way to go about deciding who will hold the scalpel while you are under anesthesia is by visiting and interviewing more than one surgeon … the same way you would act had you wanted to buy a dress!  You don’t simply try one … right?

THE BULL MUST DIE …

In Spanish-style bull fights, or “corrida de toros” as they are called, there are three matadors (bullfighters) and each fights two out of a total of six fighting bulls with the use of thrusting capes.  These bulls each weight at least 1300 lbs and are at least four years old.  

Well, a few days ago, a friend, Tom, was describing this amazing ritual that is practiced in Spain, Mexico, Colombia, Ecuador, Venezuela, Peru and Southern France. In Greece, we have a similar sacrifice with the killing of the Minotaur, which is actually symbolic of a bullfight. Anyway, Tom was in Venezuela and had attended a “corrida” and at the end of it all, he was so intrigued by this spectacular tradition, taking place in an arena that he had to go and talk to one of the matadors.  He asked him how he felt about killing the bull and the blood that is involved and the matador simply replied: “The bull must die…”

When Tom was describing his experience, I could see a spark in his eye, the spark that you see when people actually feel what they are talking about and you can sense their blood pressure going up … I was looking at him with fascination, but the anger and fury that was being emitted through his expressions and words made me think of the annoyance we feel about our selves when we are on a diet, we lose control and end up eating whatever is in front of us at the moment … and then we regret it but … it’s too late.  The calories are already consumed and being absorbed by the body, being turned into fat!

So how do we fight the bull?  How do we insert a barbed wooden decorated stick into the bull’s neck muscle to take his life away? How do we destroy the demon inside which causes the food cravings that make us want to kill for a piece of chocolate? 

Primarily, we need to start by understanding the demon and the many reasons that make us crave different foods. And here it is: sometimes we crave a particular food for comfort or a means of escape, other times we use food as a way to get quick energy or we have become addicted to a food for a number of reasons. However, we may also crave what our body most needs. Food cravings can be the body’s way of trying to correct a chemical imbalance or point to a lack of vitamins or minerals. Lastly craving certain foods may indicate a weakness in certain glands, such as the pancreas, the adrenals or the thyroid.

But here’s a bit more that you may find interesting and ... helpful:

Evolution predisposes the body to crave high fat, high sugar foods. When food was scarce, the body wanted food that was packed with calories or food that could be used quickly for energy. Pleasure chemicals, like dopamine, are released in your brain when you eat high fat, high sugar foods. This is why eating chocolate and ice cream actually “feel  good.” The body responds positively to this chemical release. 

Kicking a food habit can be more difficult than kicking cigarettes or drugs. Cutting a food from your diet is not easy—especially because you cannot give up eating. What do you do? Realize you may need to give up your food more than once. Let people know what you are doing to help yourself in avoiding temptation. Substitute other naturally sweet foods. Until refined foods became plentiful, most people satisfied sweet cravings with cooked carrots, a sweet potato, or fruit. Usually sugar cravings diminish in three to five days after elimination. Realize that food cravings do lessen over time. 

A craving for sweets may indicate a lack of minerals in the body. Are you craving sweets all the time? Your body may be looking for more minerals. If sweet cravings are especially difficult for you, try adding trace minerals to your diet and look at what happens! 

People with an overgrowth of yeast in their intestines often crave sugar. Yeast that lives in the intestines feed off simple sugars and an acid environment. Eliminating sugar and overripe fruit from the diet while eating more vegetables, makes the environment less hospitable for yeast and can decrease sugar cravings. 

Hidden ingredients may be the cause of your cravings. Read the ingredient list on the label of your favorite “healthy” snack. It may look as if you are getting more energy from all the B-vitamins in a product, when the real source is the caffeine listed as an inactive ingredient. Oftentimes sugar, caffeine, or other chemicals are added to foods to keep you coming back for more. 

Craving salty foods may indicate low adrenal gland function or low thyroid function. Salt regulates water retention in the body through the kidneys and adrenal glands. It is high in iodine, which is a mineral needed for thyroid function, therefore If you are craving salt, it may be your body asking for more iodine or potassium, or pointing to a fluid imbalance. 

You may crave a food to which you are allergic. Your body often develops sensitivity to food items you eat everyday for years. Food sensitivities can lead to symptoms similar to allergies.

              Part of optimal health is being free of food cravings and addictions. This does not mean you can never have another piece of chocolate, but it does mean asking yourself: What part of me is craving this food? Why am I craving it? When you eat a food you are craving for, ask if the craving goes away or gets stronger. Who is in control? The food or you?  And when you do answer these questions, and inevitably manage to control your cravings, then … you have successfully killed the bull!!!!

BIKINI TIME …

It's Sunday and time to write another article for the blog. I'm trying to think of what to write and everything and anything passes by my mind, in order to find something suitable. I try to think of something that will inspire me and I try to reminiscent on what happened last week … Then, I start looking around, it's partly cloudy and partly sunny. I am thinking about putting a bathing suit and sunbathing but … what do I wear?  

I skim through swimsuit websites to see what's trendy for this summer and realize that the look is becoming increasing more revealing and more skin is showing.  The bottoms are called "Brazilian" and the more I look at them the more I contemplate a possible move to Alaska …at least for the summer!  I do realize that the women presenting the swimsuits are models … but something happened to them … they seem to have not only bigger breasts but they also have bigger buttocks as well. 

And of course, my inquiring mind wants to know, thus I drop these websites and start researching the trends in plastic surgery!  Voila! Buttock augmentation or gluteal augmentation, buttock implants, or Brazilian butt lift.  Any way you name it, it boils down to one thing: the procedure intended for men and women who would like more curves which augments the shape of a person's buttocks providing a more shapely rear profile.  So now, not only do we have Brazilian bottoms in a bathing suit, but also we have Brazilian buttocks to go with them.  Nice!    

How is that possible?  Easy …  via the use of silicone or polymethyl-metacrylate (PMMA) implants which are placed either under or on top of the gluteus maximus muscle, through an incision in the midline between the buttocks or by an incision made underneath the buttocks, via hydrogel injections (which are not approved for use in the US) or via fat injections.  This requires that excess fat is removed from another part of the body, typically around the abdominal area, the hips, or the thighs, and once this fat is purified and liquified, it is re-injected into the buttocks.  Sounds easy, doesn't it? 

Unfortunately, even though it is generally speaking easy, inserting a foreign body (silicone implants) or other material injections comes with a plethora of complications making this a risky cosmetic surgery. Complication of foreign bodies other than the patient's own fat may include: the risk of infection, seromas, nerve and/or muscle damage, mal-positioning or slippage, and thus asymmetry or disfigurement, if you opt for the more permanent volumizing provided by the implants.

Fat transfers seem to be the safest way to increase volume.  Even with fat injections, the  fat injected that remains after a year varies. 

So … my question is: Is this really worth it?  In my mind, re-injecting the fat from a very precise liposculpting procedure, by a skilled Board Certified Plastic Surgeon, will do the trick!   

SUMMER, DIET AND … BODY ODOR!

This article touches on a subject that's quite sensitive to many people: body odor. Here, we explore the link between the foods we choose to consume and the odor produced by our body – yes, there is a direct correlation. With all the hundreds of millions of dollars spent each year on personal care products and deodorants, I'm amazed there's almost no discussion about reducing body odor by changing our diet. In fact, when I've mentioned this subject to some people, they looked at me in bewilderment. They ask questions like "What do you mean; our foods control our body odor? Body odor is genetic!" Thus, what we need is a crash course in the underlying causes of body odor. We'll call it “The Fundamentals of Offensive Personal Odors”, or just “Body Odor 101”, for short. 

Lesson number one in “Body Odor 101” is that what comes out of our body reflects what we put in. Body odor is something that's strongly affected by what's being emitted by our sweat glands. And remember, armpits are designed to sweat. I know that may sound insanely simple, because everybody knows that armpits sweat, but I'm saying that armpits are supposed to perspire. (Remember the saying: Horses sweat, men perspire, women glow!!!) Yet people go to great lengths to prevent their armpits from sweating using deodorant products. 

But there's more to it than just cooling your body temperature through perspiration - another function of the sweat glands in our armpits is to excrete toxins from our body. This is why sweating is an important part of maintaining optimum physical health. We have to give our body a chance to get rid of various toxins through a variety of metabolic processes. Those include urination, passing fecal matter, exhaling carbon dioxide and other toxins through the lungs, and, of course, eliminating toxins through the skin. The skin, remember, is the body's largest organ. 

Our armpits, then, actually have an important health function; getting rid of toxins. That's why we need to keep them open and unclogged by deodorant products. Sweating is good for you. 

But … what about the odor? Where does that really come from? The real cause of armpit odor is the intentional excretion of horrible toxins that our body is trying to get rid of. And by using deodorant products, we block the exit door and force these toxins to stay in our system! 

The way to eliminate body odor therefore is not to mask it with deodorant products, but rather to clean up our body from the inside out. In other words, if our armpits have a horrible raunchy smell that's an indication that our diet needs some adjusting.

Many deodorants and antiperspirants are made with aluminum, in order to halt the perspiration of our sweat glands, and this aluminum is suspected of accumulating in the nervous system and ultimately contributing to nervous system disorders such as Alzheimer's disease. When we give up red meat, junk foods, fast foods and other dietary “atrocities”, we will no longer need deodorants!

Foods that make us stink!

Let's take a closer look at the causes of body odor. Which foods really cause body odor in the first place? 

Red meat is the number one cause of body odor. It causes stagnation in the body. It actually putrefies in the digestive tract and releases all sorts of toxins into the bloodstream, through the large intestine. I've noticed that people who consume a large quantity of red meat on a regular basis tend to have much stronger body odor than those who avoid it.  Overall, if you find a healthful vegetarian and put them side by side with a heavy meat eater in a sniff test, I'm confident your nose will lead you to the conclusion that the meat eater is the most offensive of the two. It's weird science, yes, but we are talking about a strange subject to begin with!

As far as other foods go, that cause body odor, we have to talk about manufactured foods, those lacking fiber, made with refined white flour, added sugars, hydrogenated oils and other processed ingredients. These are the big culprits. When we eliminate these from our diet and shift to a more healthful diet, made of whole grains, massive quantities of leafy vegetables, fresh fruits, soy products, super greens, lots of sprouts, raw nuts and seeds, healthy oils and other similar healthful ingredients, our body odor will all but disappear in a matter of weeks.

That's because a plant-based diet is an internal deodorizer. It's true: the chlorophyll and other phytonutrients will cleanse us from the inside out. Some of the best foods for that include: parsley, cilantro, celery and all mint species. The aromatic herbs are also excellent; sage, rosemary, thyme, oregano, and so on.

As a sidebar to the body odor discussion, all the things that come out of our body are strong indicators of our current level of health, as well as what adjustments we need to make in order to be healthier. 

It's very easy to smell our own armpits and get a sense of what's going on. Try going 24 hours with no deodorant. If you can't stand the smell from the outside, just imagine what your body smells like on the inside! Maybe it's time for some changes in your diet, don’t you think?

BUT FIRST … LET ME TAKE A SELFIE …

… as the song by The Chainsmokers says!  And it seems that nowadays, whatever we do, wherever we are, we have to take a selfie! 

What is a selfie?  Well, the Oxford Dictionary defines it as “a photograph that one has taken of oneself, typically one taken with a smartphone or webcam and loaded to a social media website”.   On November 19^th, 2013, they even went ahead to announce selfie as their international Word of the Year 2013.  The Word of the Year is a word (or an expression) that has attracted a great deal of interest during the year to date.  The Oxford Dictionaries’ editors conducted language research revealing that the frequency of the word selfie in the English language has increased by a staggering 17,000% since the same time last year. 

So where does that leave us?  What does this mean?  Is technology taking over and we are victims of trends? Have selfies influenced our existence?  Thinking about it, I was actually reading the TIMES the other day, and it said: “As tweens and teens try to form their identity, selfies serve as a way to test how they look, and therefore feel, in certain outfits, make-up, poses and places.  And because they live in a digital world, self-portraits provide a way of participating and affiliating with that world.”

Having read that, actually scared me … I got to realize that selfies can actually be influential in molding the sense of self … something that a few years ago we would do by reading books, searching the web, listening to the news, watching people and interacting with them, and even following fashion trends … but this … this gadget/camera we have in our hands is actually taking more control of our “being” than anything else in history.

            But it seems that I’m not the only one inquiring about the effect of selfies!  A survey conducted by the American Academy of Facial Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery is actually coming out saying that the selfie culture is actually even changing the cosmetic surgery numbers and shifting the trends.  The survey found that 30% of the facial plastic surgeons surveyed saw an increase in requests for procedures due to patients being more self aware of looks in social media and that a great number of patients were dissatisfied with their own image on social media sites.   This is really having a poll on self-confidence with people needing to hold a microscope up to their image and self-critique it.  Even if these pictures are taken from our most flattering angle, they still may have lighting issues and they may still force us to see whether we are comfortable … within our skin!  After all, these images, uploaded in the social media sites, are the “first impressions” given to other young people, potential romantic partners and even employers!

            The outcome?  A 30% increase in “changing appearance” procedures performed on younger patients, when prior the selfie-era, the facial procedures where mainly performed to prevent or erase the visible signs of aging. And now you may ask: What are the “changing appearance” procedures?  Well, they include, but are not limited to otoplasty, rhinoplasty, mentoplasty, cheek implants, lip augmentation, scar revisions, and so on.

            Otoplasty, also known as ear surgery, will get rid of protruding ears that may have given us the cruel nicknames of “Dumbo” or “Mickey Mouse” from our beloved classmates! This surgery can offer a real emotional boost in addition to its cosmetic benefits.

            Rhinoplasty, also known as nose surgery, will enhance the appearance of the nose, a part of our breathing system that unfortunately sits right in the middle of our face and has a great impact on our appearance.  With proper analysis, realistic patient expectations and the skills of a qualified and board certified facial plastic surgeon, rhinoplasty is a very rewarding procedure, which makes a huge difference in overall facial harmony.

            Mentoplasty, also known as chin surgery, will help give balance to the face and create a major part of one’ s profile, especially if the procedure is done on a “weak chin” which obviously is not an asset.  This procedure may take one of two routes: chin augmentation or chin reduction.  The augmentation is achieved with the help of chin implants available in a wide variety of sizes and shapes, while the reduction sculpts the bone to a more pleasing size.

            Cheek implants add aesthetically pleasing definition to the face improving the contour of the middle of the face creating higher and more prominent cheekbones. The size and contour of the cheek implants to be used will be determined by your plastic surgeon and custom fit to achieve the most natural looking results.

            Lip augmentation is basically a cosmetic procedure that can give fuller and plumber lips but can still change the overall balance of the face and give … better selfies!

            Scar revision is needed when the skin is injured from a cut or tear and the body heals by forming scar tissue.  These scars may range from being nearly visible to very obvious and disfiguring, often times acting a reminder of the traumatic experience associated with it. There are various surgical techniques used in scar revision and it really all depends on the scar, where it is located and how it looks.  A visit to your plastic surgeon will give you all the options available for this revision surgery and may be even a bad memory erasure!

            And now that I’m done with the article … let me take a selfie!!!  NOT!!!

Works cited:

1)    http://healthland.time.com/2013/09/06/why-selfies-matter/

2)    www.webmd.com

3)    www.aafprs.org

4)    www.plasticsurgery.org