Illinois Plastic Surgery

Abigail Aaronson asked:


While most men and women lose pounds through diet and exercise, some need a little extra help. If you were frustrated by years of diets and exercise that never gave you any consistency, and you turned to bariatric surgery for help, you may be left with a great healthy body, but lots of sagging skin.

This group of patients, and even some of those who are able to lose weight through more traditional techniques, is often left with excess hanging skin and fat deposits in places on their bodies that can only be smoothed and contoured with plastic surgery.

Exercise and diet will get you only so far in sculpting your body if you have undergone a major weight loss. Plastic surgery is then required to deal with the excess skin and fat deposits on those people who have undergone a massive loss of over 100 pounds; the body just can’t take care of it on its own.

Weight loss surgery is increasing in popularity, as the population of the U.S. continues to recognize the need for a healthy lifestyle.

More and more plastic surgeons are seeing patients in their offices who are in need of body contouring procedures to help the patient who just lost a massive amount of pounds to look even better and feel even better in their new bodies.

Generally, patients looking to have cosmetic procedures after a weight loss are looking to remove excess skin and fat deposits which are left in the areas of their face, neck, arms, breasts, abdomen, back, and thighs.

While weight loss patients are usually very interested in plastic surgery procedures, it is important to note that patients who have undergone a rapid and extreme loss have skin which is much more lax than those who have lost over time or who were not overweight at all.

This means that weight loss patients will see results from the procedure; however, the results are likely to be less than expected than those who not lost massive weight.

It is acknowledged that tummy tucks are often one of the first procedures performed post weight loss.

There are many surgeries to consider if you have undergone a serious weight loss. They include:

* abdominoplasty (tummy tuck),

* circumferential lower body lift,

* breast lift,

* arm lift,

* face lift,

* neck lift,

* and other body contouring procedures to make your body look so great after your hard work.

If you’re considering having plastic surgery, it is advisable that you speak with a Board Certified Plastic Surgeon in your area and discuss your options and expected outcomes.

By working with an experienced cosmetic surgeon they can help you to understand what your body could look like and what the risks of having the surgical procedures might be.

If you are looking for improvement to your new slim body and are otherwise in healthy condition, plastic surgery might be just what is needed to help you slim the abdomen or contour your legs and arms to look great!



Marlon

Jennifer Kimberley asked:


There is often some confusion about these terms, as different people and websites use them differently. Here’s how they should be used.

• Plastic Surgery – is the over-arching term, including the other two

• Reconstructive Surgery – is done for functional reasons on abnormal body structures which have resulted from congenital or developmental defects, trauma or disease

• Cosmetic Surgery – is done for esthetic reasons on normal body structures, to improve or enhance a person’s attractiveness, and it might also address minor function issues in the process

Basic Training

To perform reconstructive or cosmetic surgery, a physician must be qualified as a plastic surgeon. That means a minimum of:

1. Graduation from medical school

2. Licensing by a State Licensing Board

Legally speaking, nothing more is necessary, but you would not want to entrust your health to a physician who had no more qualification than that. Board-certification is highly important in assuring you that the doctor has gone further in his specialty training.

Specialty Training

So you would want to look for a surgeon who is:

3. Certified by the American Board of Plastic Surgery (ABPS) This is one of 24 accredited specialty boards recognized by the American board of Medical Specialties (ABMS).

Professional Memberships

The best plastic surgeons also have memberships in other medical organizations such as:

• The American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS)

• The American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery (ASAPS)

• The American College of Surgeons (ACS)

• The American Medical Association (AMA)

These memberships keep a physician in touch with his peers, and up to date with new ideas, techniques, and technology. They require high standards of their members.

Reconstructive Surgery

Reconstructive surgery is a very wide field and has subdivisions. It often works on children who are born with an abnormality such as a cleft palate, large disfiguring birthmark, or hand deformities.

Burn patients are another large category and often need reconstructive surgery where the entire skin and areas beneath it were destroyed. Accident victims may need replantation, which is the reattachment of a lost body part like fingers, ear, nose, arm or penis. Blood flow must be reconnected, the bones and muscles reattached, and nerves repaired.

The American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS) collects statistics each year, and for 2006, the most often performed reconstructive surgery was removal of cancerous tumors (3,905,831 such procedures). The procedure second in frequency, and very far behind, was laceration repair, at 312,855 procedures.

Cosmetic Surgery

Cosmetic surgery is a growing field and involves enhancement or recontouring of the face and body, as well as a spectrum of skin treatments. The ASPS gives these surgical procedures as the top five for 2006:

• Breast augmentation (329,000) – implants to enlarge the breasts

• Rhinoplasty (307,000) – recontouring of the nose

• Liposuction (303,000) – removal of fat from selected body areas

• Eyelid surgery (233,000) – removal of excess fat, skin and muscle to restore youthfulness to the eyes

• Tummy Tuck (146,000) – removal of excess fat and skin from the abdomen, and tightening of the abdominal muscles

Skin improvement treatments are continually being developed, such as various chemical peels, microdermabrasion, and laser skin resurfacing. Injectable fillers are very popular, such as Restylane, Sculptra and Radiesse. Botox injections are often given to smooth out frown lines and forehead creases. These are all non-invasive procedures, as opposed to invasive (surgical) procedures, but modern cosmetic surgeons offer them all the time.



Noel

Janie W. Puentes asked:


As poverty started to become a serious threat for the lives of many less fortunate people, many organizations around the world are now having their plans and actions on how to stop this problem before it gets worse. One of these organizations is the Plasticos Foundation. An organization composed of plastic surgeons headed by Dr. Larry Nichter. Plasticos Foundation’s primary goal is to improve the lives of others particularly the children in need through plastic surgery that is why the said foundation is identified as a plastic surgery organization.

Through the foundation’s intervention, they enhance the lives of children with correctable body deformities, birth defects, congenital malformations and traumatic disfigurements. The foundation also seeks to advance the field of Plastic Surgery through trainings, research studies, and public education that is why they conduct lectures and free trainings to surgeons in host countries in the art of Plastic Surgery, enabling them to carry on this work.

Plasticos Foundation cannot be called as a plastic surgery organization without its plastic surgeon volunteers who came from different parts of the world. These volunteers with the expertise in the said field serve and give their best because they want to reshape the deprived lives of many children who were victims of physical defects in their bodies. In addition, they are doing this kind act because they want to break the wall that hinders children who have these curses in showing up themselves in the society and give these innocents a new hope to survive life.

“Since the children are said to be the new hope of the world, then we should guide and put them on the right path, and uplift their lives from deprivation”, “We believe all individuals, especially the young, negatively affected by correctable deformities deserve to be made whole”, these are what the volunteers of Plasticos consider every time they render their service.

Through the benevolence of Plasticos Foundation, many lives of children have changed and have given a new hope. The faces infected with sadness are replaced with happiness as the curse in their life is removed through the magic touch of the surgeons and the glowing smiles started to shine in their innocent faces. Until now, Plasticos Foundation still continues its philanthropy. To help, to serve, to nurture and to mold the lives of the new generation! That is what Plasticos aims and believes.



Jude