When her mom’s gynecologist mailed a postcard announcing she was adding cosmetic procedures to her practice, Kristen Cortland* didn’t hesitate to see her about the prominent bags under her eyes. “She’s a really good gynecologist, so I assumed she’d be good at anything she did,” says the 29-year-old Chicago-based realtor.
Right after being injected with something called a “natural fat burner” (it was actually a substance called Lipodissolve that has not been approved by the Food and Drug Administration) by her mom’s OB-GYN, Cortland felt unbearable pressure in her eyes. “Before I left her office, my eyes blew up really big,” she says. “At home, my face got so puffy that, in profile, you couldn’t see my nose.” Cortland kept calling the doc’s office, and kept being told that there was no need for a follow-up visit. “Honestly, I don’t think she knew what to tell me,” she says.
Six weeks later, when her features finally reemerged, Cortland still had the original problem, plus a new one: a prominent indentation between her lower eyelid and cheek that will need to be surgically corrected. Still, she was one of the lucky ones, says her new physician, Julius Few, MD, associate professor of plastic and reconstructive surgery at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago: “She could have gone blind.”
If your doc hasn’t gone cosmetic yet, it may just be a matter of time. As the cosmetic business booms (noninvasive procedures—including microdermabrasion, lasering, injectables, and chemical peels—are up 747 percent since 1997), more and more OB-GYNs and general practitioners (GPs) are branching out into aesthetic procedures. In fact, so many OB-GYNs have added lipo, Botox, and the like to their offerings, that they’ve even created a society: the four-year-old International Society of Cosmetogynecology.
This trend could mean easy one-stop shopping for you, or it could mean a really bad, even disfiguring, experience like the one Cortland had. Here’s what you need to know to face this new in-thing safely.
Next page: The cosmetic revolution
Comments (3)
Awesome article – clearly something to think about
MAXIDEX WRNING
I had eye surgery and in the post-op pack was MAXIDEX(dexamethasone) drops by ALCON LABS.
Two days later I was BLIND
Use Google and enter EPOCRATES MAXIDEX to verify
I am glad I had a chance to read your post, if you have more information on positions let me know or post it here.
Mike