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Show J Plastic surgery is combination of both science and image By JILLYN SMITH Science Writer Utah State University A recent newspaper story reported re-ported that a New York plastic surgeon, from examining photographs, photo-graphs, thinks Michael Jackson has had about ten different plastic surgery procedures, including nose, chin, cheek and eye alterations altera-tions and a chemical peel. Jackson isn't talking about it, and his surgeon remains a mystery. I interviewed a plastic surgeon once. He had hundreds of fascinating fascinat-ing before and after photographs, and was proud that he had never been sued. He had had celebrity patients, he said, but wouldn't name them. He said the friends of his cosmetic cosme-tic surgery patients often think they've changed their hair or makeup or been on vacation. Jackson's friends probably just think he's been on a world tour. A better self-image and repair of psychological problems are important impor-tant side effects of cosmetic surgery, the plastic surgeon told me. "We don't use plastic," he was careful to say, "although my patients pa-tients often ask, 'When are you gonna put the plastic in, doc?' Instead, In-stead, 'plastic' refers to the reforming reform-ing and redefining the skin and its underlying bone, cartilage and fat." This guy is a sculptor of living tissue. He got bored taking out gall bladders, fixing up internal organs. Who sees those things, anyway? He began doing plastic surgery as an emergency-room repairman. Word got around and his office filled fil-led up. Each case is different. He fixes victims of unkind nature: kids with jug ears or smiles that are all gums, women who have trouble buying clothes because they have a size 8 top and a size 14 bottom or vice versa, or men who think they aren't taken seriously because they have a receding or a jutting jaw. He fixes victims of birth defects, skin cancer, breast cancer, biting dogs, industrial accidents and motorcycle accidents. He fixes droops resulting from drastic weight loss. He reconstructs. He sculpts.' He makes people happy. He learns about new tools and procedures: CT scans to look at underlying structures, computers to simulate growth patterns or answer "what if?", tissue expanders expan-ders to hide a scalp wound, lasers to remove birthmarks. The plastic surgeon described how he made a new nose for a guy who lost his old nose to an airplane propeller. He took a little skin from the guy's forehead, a little cartilage from behind his ear, a little bone from where it wouldn't be missed, made a few finishing touches. "I rob Peter to pay Paul," he said, with a smile. It was science. It was art. It was p.r. And, it was comforting. Plastic surgeons, Richard Selzer wrote, take the world in for repairs. One at a time. |
