And now, the final four of Dr. Youn's Plastic Surgery Predictions for 2010:
4. The Lunchtime "One Hour" Mini-Facelifts will Continue to Be Exposed For What They Are: Misleading Advertising by Poorly Trained Cosmetic Surgeons - 2009 saw one mini-facelift company fined by a state attorney general for posting false internet reviews. The numbers of real facelifts by real plastic surgeons continue to grow after a slight dip a few years ago. Will 2010 continue to reveal the truth behind mini-facelift centers? I hope so.
3. Nonsurgical Liposuction Will Remain the Holy Grail of Plastic Surgery - 2009 saw the emergence of Zerona, currently the only laser used in widespread fashion for nonsurgical inch loss. Even though it does appear to work, there are many other companies working on their own nonsurgical liposuction devices, including Cryolipolysis, External Ultrasound (Ultrashape and Liposonix), and others. I don't think we'll see these machines FDA-approved in 2010, but anticipation will continue to build for their possible emergence in 2011.
2. There Will Unfortunately Be More and More Plastic Surgery Disasters By Phony Plastic Surgeons - In 2009 we saw an increasing number of phony plastic surgeons losing their medical licenses, performing botched procedures, and even having their patients die from poor or improper care. There was an occupational medicine physician performing carboxytherapy on a patient who died (link), a family doc who made a 10 cm incision for a free promotional breast augmentation (link), and the ER doc whose patients died after he performed liposuction on them (link). What's next? A radiologist using his patients' liposuctioned fat to power his car? Oh, that's right. That's already happened (link).
1. After two years of mild decline, the number of people undergoing plastic surgery is going to significantly increase. 2008 saw the amount of plastic surgery performed decline, possibly for the first time ever. I expect that the amount of plastic surgery performed in 2009 will also follow this trend when the American Society of Plastic Surgeons releases their statistics later this year. With the Great Recession over, however, I believe that more and more people will have plastic surgery in 2010. After a two year dip, things may return to the levels they were back in 2007. It also helps that the Bo-Tax has been killed.
I predict that this positive plastic surgery trend will be present in all states except one: Michigan. Bummer.
Thanks for reading.
Michigan-based Plastic Surgeon
Anthony Youn, M.D.:
