If you believe medical aesthetics will give you the perfect body and the perfect life, consider for a moment one tiny detail: the mole above Cindy Crawford’s top lip.
Crawford was advised as a teenager to have the mole removed if she wanted a career in modelling. She ignored the advice and went on to become one of the world’s most famous supermodels.
Like the tilt of the Leaning Power or Pisa or a solitary cloud in a clear blue sky, it is imperfections and flaws that contribute to the creation of unique beauty. The quest for an ideal of flawless beauty is futile and self-defeating.
Cosmetic procedures are exploding in popularity today. Celebrities and social media influencers parade before our eyes a relentless stream of sometimes unrealistic, exaggerated, and heavily filtered visions of bodily perfection.
Against this background, responsible doctors must offer guidance to unsuitable patients such as sufferers of body dysmorphia—an irrational and disproportionate fixation on perceived flaws.
Of course, it’s fine for a patient to want to look like a celebrity or friend whose looks they admire, so long as their expectations are realistic and they accept guidance when told the procedure may not be right for them.
Doctors may also refuse treatment to patients with certain chronic diseases which may complicate the healing and recovery process.
Good aesthetic treatments can be life-enhancing and work wonders for a person’s self-esteem, but they must be done for the right reasons. They won’t fix shattered marriages or relationships, and they must be what the patient—not a spouse or friend—wants.
There are two categories of patients who are suitable for aesthetic treatments should they wish it. The first includes patients with a strong self-image who are bothered by a particular characteristic they would like to improve or change. These patients generally feel good about the results of the procedure and maintain their positive attitude.
Then there are patients with a physical defect or cosmetic flaw that has diminished their self-esteem over time. These patients take a little longer to adjust after certain procedures but their self-image is sometimes significantly strengthened after the adjustment.
By contrast, there are other categories of patients who should steer away from aesthetic treatments or at least seek counselling before they go through with cosmetic procedures, including people going through significant life events, such as a divorce, the death of a partner, or the loss of a job—and seek instant goals that a change in appearance will not achieve.
Other people who should steer clear of cosmetic procedures include those with unrealistic expectations, who believe for instance that having a celebrity’s nose may open the door to a celebrity lifestyle, or who want to look identical to someone else. Also, people who go from doctor to doctor seeking the answers they want to hear in search of a cure for a problem which is sometimes not really physical at all.
Finally, there are people obsessed with a very minor defect, who believe their life will be complete once that tiny defect is fixed; as well as people with certain mental health issues, whose objectives for procedures may be related to their conditions, who would need to seek professional help from mental health professionals first.
Most of all, patients must accept that however much aesthetic procedures may change their appearance, it will not alter the attitudes and mindsets of the people around them. Their heightened self-esteem may have a positive impact, but the cure will only ever be skin-deep.
Medical aesthetics can be a wonderful way to improve your appearance, so long as expectations are realistic, and you are not seeking an elusive concept of perfection. As surrealist painter Salvador Dalí put it: “Have no fear of perfection—you’ll never reach it.”
This is part of a monthly column by Dr Lisa Chan, a Hong Kong-based general practitioner who has an avid interest in medical beauty. Dr Chan, MBChB (CUHK), MScPD (Cardiff), PgDipPD (Cardiff), PGDipClinDerm (Lond), DipMed (CUHK), DCH (Sydney), also holds a master's degree in practical dermatology with distinction at Cardiff University.
