Denver Plastic Surgery Reource Articles

31-December 2006 Resource Article - ONE NATION IN ITS CUPS—SILICONE APPROVAL EXTENDS BEYOND THE VALLEY

They arrive in the room 15 minutes before she does. Please do not pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about. They are Hollywood, or rather the symbol of it in the last few decades. Mid-century, they were the naturals. Starlets with breasts that set them apart from the average woman. They were certainly beautiful women too. An arch to the eyebrow that could lay men low. A tilt of the chin that suggested indifference. With radiant uncapped perfect teeth, pure baby-soft skin, and legs for days, these WWII pinup girls and ’60s leading ladies were rarities. One in a million. Enhanced only with makeup and peroxide. They didn’t go under the knife.

Then came plastic surgery, compounding the number of women who could own glamorous good looks even if they didn’t come by them naturally. And that surgery didn’t come cheap. Ownership of looks gained through cosmetic surgery was inextricably linked to wealth, so the larger majority of good looking dames were those who were born wealthy or earned their wealth through marriage or their business savvy. Thus such improvements were relegated to socialites who didn’t talk publicly about what they’d had done. “I was touring China and had a rickshaw accident,” more than one society-type claimed following a face lift.

But while the older well-heeled women were seeking the lift, the younger set was focused on their figures. Breasts, the kind that made men go gaga over a low-cut gown, were the new attraction. Suddenly a woman with not-so-much could be all that. The Victoria’s Secret angels on dinnertime television and on New York City’s Times Square big screen, made breasts into something even women noticed and wanted.

In the last few years, the increase in women and men seeking cosmetic and plastic surgery has soared. Exponential numbers have elected to get invasive (surgical) and non-invasive (injections, lasers, etc.) treatments to retain and restore a more youthful appearance. Breast implants and in fact implants of multiple types have gained acceptance and even become the centerpiece of conversation: who’s done what lately is often a question among friends. Celebrity rags and talk shows regularly debate who has done what in terms of upkeep.

The FDA approval of Silicone for general augmentation has inspired phones to ring in Dr. Lee’s office. These are the women who were on the edge about having implants calling to schedule an appointment, explains Dr. Lee. Until now the more pliable, natural looking and feeling Silicone implants were limited to breast reconstructive surgery patients.

Dr. Ben Lee is a board certified surgeon practicing in Englewood, CO. He also has his MBA and one of the thesis papers he wrote studied the two manufacturers of silicone implants in this country—Mentor and Inamed. “They are the cartel of implants,” he explains. They have offices across the street from each other in Santa Barbara, CA and no interest in undercutting each other’s pricing because they own the industry. Both companies produce very similar, high quality implants.

Only two days after the FDA approval came, so did marketing packets from both companies to doctors across the country. The differences between Saline and Silicone run much deeper than cost and feel. Silicone can be implanted on top of the muscle tissue rather than underneath it like Saline implants. Silicone is also, according to Dr. Lee, the optimum type of implant for women without a whole lot of breast tissue, something most women seeking implants don’t have naturally. “The two things people worry about are downtime and cost,” the Doctor says.

Implants run about $6500 and about $8000 with a lift in Dr. Lee’s practice.

Why the FDA took so long to approve Silicone for general use baffles some surgeons. A court-ordered consensus study in the late 1990’s took all the studies ever done on implants of both fabrication and measured the risks and side-effects. The conclusion was that neither the Saline nor the Silicone was any more dangerous than the other. Yet Silicone took another decade to gain FDA approval for general use.

And still the size of the investment into cups has remained regional. California (think super-sized Pamela Anderson) is the land of bigger-is-better. In Colorado, Surgeons like Dr. Ben Lee caution their patients to avoid such extremes. We are not Hollywood, and yet we’re thisclose.

To learn more about Dr. Ben Lee, see www.drbenlee.com or call him at 303-783-9997. His email is ben@drbenlee.com.