The Quest for the Fountain of Youth by Leslie Cardé
ONCE UPON A TIME, cosmetic surgery was the domain of celebrities and wealthy matrons who yearned to appear younger with a nip here and a tuck there. Today, the whole landscape has changed. The assortment of procedures available now to stave off wrinkles, plump up areas deemed underwhelming, diminish so-called problem areas, and generally, to coin a phrase, turn back the hands of time are mind-bending. It’s a grab-bag of new technology designed to accomplish the most… with the least amount of downtime. But, it takes a real expert to know which procedure is indicated for what patient, or if it’s actually needed at all. In the unfettered world of social media where selfies are filtered and Photoshopped, the pervasiveness of these perfected images has had untold consequences on the psyches of America’s youth… and beyond. So widespread is this problem, that the syndrome even has a name… Snapchat dysmorphia, characterized by the compulsive need to edit one’s own digital image. So, how does anyone feel adequate in a world where one is surrounded by unattainable beauty 32
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standards? To find answers to these weighty topics and to get an idea of the realistic trends and techniques in the world of cosmetic surgery, we assembled a panel of plastic surgeons to shed light on just how far we’ve come in attaining our unrelenting quest for youth. To obtain this panel, more than thirty New Orleans area physicians were asked for their recommendations, and over thirty-five patients who had undergone plastic surgery (many of whom you would recognize) were queried about their surgical Svengalis. To make it into our list of six, the surgeon’s name had to appear on at least four different lists. The particular surgeons chosen are all board-certified, have had extensive hospital training, and have popped up on more than a few “Best of” lists throughout their careers. Most importantly, they are held in high regard by both their peers and their patients. As with all medicine, prevention is often the name of the game. Correct whatever it is before it becomes a problem down the road. The trend in cosmetic plastic surgery adheres to the same tenet. If you can prevent your face from actively grimacing or furrowing when you’re young, you more than likely will not have these lines etched into your face when you are older. Enter the baby Botox era in which microinjections of a smaller amount of botulinum toxin are injected into the faces of 20 somethings who may just see the very beginning of a line erupting between their eyebrows.