What Plastic Surgery is Really About

The world of plastic surgery has changed dramatically even in the course of just a few short years as new advances are made and new lines in the sand are drawn. But plastic surgery isn’t just an option for people who are striving for physical perfection. This is also a valid option for patients who have a deformity to correct due to a birth defect, accident or injury and without surgery would be committed to a life that was limited by their physical appearance.

When you think of a birth defect like cleft pallet you may not realize that the surgeons who are correcting this life altering birth defect are doing more than helping a child look “normal” they are also helping that child have a normal life. A child with a cleft pallet has more obstacles than the physical deformity in front of them. They may also have a hard time completing simple tasks required to live like swallowing, eating, drinking, and chewing. And this birth defect is not limited to third world countries where the cause can clearly be drawn to poor maternal health. The United States has a lot of children born with this birth defect and the reasons aren’t always clear or easy to understand. But even born in a developed country like the United States, won’t guarantee a child will survive without medical intervention and that includes plastic surgery.

Other patients who have made headlines recently include patients who have suffered life altering injuries due to animal attacks and as a result where left without a face-literally. While these cases may be extreme they do call for the skill set of a plastic surgeon for any chance of living a normal life.

For most of us though plastic surgery is an elective surgery that won’t dramatically alter life but it will alter the physical appearance and change those aspects about ourselves that we don’t hold near and dear. Sometimes the changes are so subtle no one else may even be aware of them, but it’s often enough for the receipt to know the changes have been made.

Most surgeons will likely agree that patients who seek out plastic surgery are looking to correct what the patient considers an obstacle to beauty. Those changes can be as small as a bump on the nose or as big as breast augmentation.

The only important thing patients need to keep in mind, regardless of what procedure they are undertaking is to make sure they are choosing surgery for the right reasons and that they fully understand the risk and potential complications associated with any surgical procedure even a cosmetic one.