As was sung by Christina Aguilera, “You are beautiful no matter what they say. Words can’t bring you down. You are beautiful in every single way “. However, in today’s society the picture of beauty is a rail thin super model with the body of a goddess posted on billboards all around the world. Many people believe that to be happy in life and be beautiful to all that see them, they must have the beautiful bodies of runway super models or the muscles of Mr. Universe. Because of these pictures and other figures of beauties projected all over, a person is convinced to believe that to be beautiful and happy, one must look like these images.
To most, the easiest way to achieve this is by having cosmetic surgery performed. Society today has brain washed not only today’s women, but also the men to believe that in order for a person to look beautiful they must look like the images seen on television, in movies and on the cover of magazines. With all these visions of beauty seen everywhere in a person’s everyday life, a person feels compelled to look just like those images. Many women and men use plastic surgery to help them feel good about themselves.
When people think about having plastic surgery procedures, they think about how beautiful they will look once they have healed. Plastic surgery is often associated with a picture perfect look, free of wrinkles, blemishes, scars and any other physical problem, almost undermining the risks involved in the procedure. Overall, in United Kingdom, 43,069 plastic surgery procedures were done by association members for men and women in 2011, compared with 38,274 in 2010, a rise of 5. 8%. Also, for the last ten years, the consensus has been that breast augmentation was the most popular plastic surgery procedure.
Even after the significant progress in technology, plastic surgery still involves many side effects, dangers and undesirable outcomes. No matter how good the technological advancements, there is always the risk of not only the surgery resulting in unwanted outcomes but in some cases death and people seems do not completely aware about this. Of course when you talk to plastic surgeons, you will hear them trying to assure you there is zero risk and nothing awful can possibly happen. They will tell you with today’s modern plastic surgery innovations, everything will go perfectly well.
Even though in most cases plastic surgeries are safe, when you choose a reliable, experienced doctor, it is still wise to know of the possible effects and risks. First and for most, the very bad effect or risk of plastic surgery that patients very scare to face is death. The American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS) estimates that there is 1 death in 57,000 procedures, while a study in the medical journal Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery put the death rate slightly higher, at about one in 51,459 operations. These are very, very low mortality rates.
But very low-risk is not the same thing as no risk. A very low mortality rate does not mean that no deaths ever happen with cosmetic surgery. They happen. Donda West, mother of hip-hop star Kanye West and a retired college English professor, died after a combined tummy tuck and breast reduction procedure, apparently as a result of complications from the plastic surgery procedure. Next, one of the effects that must be taken into an account is the risks of a surgery procedure. For instance, a complication can occur from the local anesthetic given to the patients while undergoing the surgery.
People allergic to the local anesthetic can have very severe reactions to the drug. One example is a person waking up during surgery. This can cause the person to feel every pock and prick performed during the surgery yet the person is not able to speak or move. Therefore, the patient has no way of informing the doctors or nurses that they are not “asleep” for the procedure. So, they will feel the pain of their skins and bones being cut and drilled during hours of surgery. They feel like dying for hours but unable to do anything except from suffering the very awful pain.
Just imagine how tragic and painful this situation is. It has been observed that many individuals undergoing plastic surgery tend to suffer from an obsession or an infatuation with their look. This can cause an addiction and may impel them to undergo plastic surgery several times. In this situation, plastic surgery becomes more than just a single factor that improves their life. It becomes their life. An unhealthy obsession with plastic surgery to the extent that a person’s self-esteem is dependent on regular, new operations to fuel this obsession, can have a devastating impact.
Such patients constantly feel ugly and they fuel this feeling by getting repeated plastic surgeries in the hopes that each one will make them feel attractive. Sadly, this does not occur. Each new surgery gives the patient a buzz of sorts that is often fuelled by the attention they receive from friends, families or even strangers. But the buzz is short-lived and soon, they need another plastic surgery to relive that high. Another issue is when patients continue to seek out plastic surgery on the same body part.
Without being concerned about no matter what the surgical outcomes, they are convinced that the body parts are not perfect enough and no other surgery makes it so either. Furthermore, with surgeons profiting from plastic surgery, their ability to assess a patient for an addiction to plastic surgery could also be compromised. Surgeons who do the treatment worsen the patients’ addictive feelings. The public further fuels the addiction. They not just accept it but also give the glowing feedback that leaves the addict wanting even more. Besides that, more complications can also arise from improper training of the surgeons.
Dr Laughlin from Hilton Head Island Plastic Surgery said that many “discount” price plastic surgeons that claim to offer professional service for a low price have begun to show up all over the country. Most of these doctors not even properly trained to perform such drastic cosmetic surgeries. Since the price on cosmetic surgery has come down, many people are making a vacation out of it, where they take a week off and fly to the doctors that will perform the surgery. With the increase of untrained surgeons performing these procedures, the risk of death and improper results also increases greatly.
Low-income people that are attracted to the visions of beauty on the magazines are caught in the lure of these “fake” surgeons. These doctors promise perfect results at half the price of experienced surgeons. Some of these doctors may even produce fake credentials, such as fake PhDs, for customers to view. Customers see these and without doing any research on the doctor, pay the money for the surgery to be performed. There was an issue in Miami where a fake surgeon, “Doctor” Reinaldo Silvestre, practicing out of a small office, was accused of using a kitchen-type spatula to force female breast implants in to a male bodybuilder’s chest.
In two other surgeries, Silvestre performed breast augmentation on two females that resulted in the deformation of both women’s chests. Most of these doctors also perform their surgeries in unsanitary conditions such as office-based procedures. Since they do not have the license from the right authority, mandatory testing is not performed on their surgical tools and area. As a result of this, infections can occur after the surgery has been performed. Mycobacterium can cause skin or wound infection to the patient after the surgery.
Dirty tools can cause bacteria to be present in the body after the surgery, resulting in infection and sometimes death. So, to minimise the risks and number of people who choose to do plastic surgery, here are some suggestions. First, government should enact the law that plastic surgeries are only allowed to those whose purpose is to restore damaged body parts. The damages might be because of accidents that they suffered which pressured them in facing the world outside. As you can see, not everyone having plastic surgery is doing it for a smaller nose, bigger breasts or fairer skins.
However, many people have real disfigurations that can be easily corrected and allow them to live more normal lives. Second, patients have to report to the police if they happen to know about surgeons who faked their certificates. By that, the authorities can take the action on sentencing them to very heavy punishments like whole life imprisonment and fines that involve a large amount of money or both. The fake surgeons can be charged under fraud and also for causing harms to others by giving illegal and unauthorized services. Third, patients have to do enough research before they choose a plastic surgeon.
Compare the before and after pictures of their previous patients and try to get access to their previous patients and ask about their experience with this doctor. By this way, patients can easily find a reliable, skilled doctor with 100% success rate. So they can rest assured their plastic surgery will be perfect. Make sure that your surgeon is board certified as a plastic surgeon. Surgeons become board certified when they have had more than six years of surgical training and experience. All in all, even if everything goes well after your plastic surgery, you may still have bad effects later on.
As time passes, your body changes and your age too, so you will still have lines and wrinkles. Breast implants can get misshapen or lumpy, and they do not last forever and will need to be replaced at some point. We should not only cut back on the use of plastic surgery for safety reasons but also because it is destroying the simple beauty of a person being who they are. People should not be concerned with trying to live up to society’s standards and by the price of the operations. They should most be concerned with the real price, which are their lives.