Breast Implants
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Here’s more on our series on the laws of unintended product uses.
(Read our blog post about breast implants as body armor.)
When Ebay, the huge online market and auction site first appeared, very few people ever imagined it would be a place to obtain breast implants. (Make that used breast implants!)
Case in point: Sharon Osbourne, TV star and mate of mumbling rockstar Ozzy Osbourne, has announced she does not like her current breast augmentation because the implants are too round and too big.
Actually, Sharon falls into a trend of midlife woman who once had breast enhancement and then decide to go back under the knife for a reduction in size.
Many decide larger breasts are uncomfortable and get in the way. Plus, they no longer need large “girls” because they are no longer trolling for a mate.
Said Ozzy: “Ah’m shu Sha don madaupa ‘er mind ‘cause, Sha always knowz whaa Sha wanndo wiff ‘er fac…”
Anyhow, Sharon has already forked over about $600,000 for cosmetic plastic surgery including:
- Face lift
- Buttocks lift and augmentation
- Weight loss surgery
- Tummy tuck
But where does Ebay fit in?
Sharon wants to eventually have her DD implants removed and exchanged for smaller implants.
And, get this: she wants to sell them on Ebay.
Wonder where Sharon got that idea?
Perhaps from entertainer and former California gubernatorial candidate Mary Carey who listed her old breast implants on Ebay in 2007. The starting bid was about $2200. But, hey, the implants were autographed!
Back in 2005, an exotic dancer who appeared under the name Tawny Peaks had her somewhat unwieldy 69-HH implants removed after her dancing career. GoldenPlace.com reportedly paid $13,000 for one of the implants as a publicity stunt. (Read more about the breast implant sale.)
Yet another celebrity – at least in the U.K. – made the news for almost selling her implants in Ebay.
British pop princess Kerry Katona placed an autographed 34GG implant on Ebay – with all profits going to charity — but the site removed the listing because the paperwork relating to charities was not listed correctly.
Nonetheless, if you look on Ebay, you’ll find somewhere around 12, not-for-surgery breast implants ranging in size from 275 to 650 cc’s.
Of course, for a measly 80 bucks, nobody famous has autographed them!
admin @ March 12, 2010
Lap Band Surgery
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You know how stereotypes can sometimes be more true than not.
Case in point: police vehicles in donut parking lots.
One would assume that the ingestion of donuts — and a subsequent weight gain — would also be under way.
Down Under in Australia, the police may not be loading up on donuts but biscuits (“cookies” in the U.S.) and other fattening foods.
According to The Perth Sunday Times, taxpayers are helping to pay for overweight police officers to have Lap Band surgery. The police union is contributing the equivalent of $2000 toward each officer’s surgery; the cost of Lap Band surgery in Australia is about $6000. The idea is to combat chronic illness, lowering other health costs.
As any Lap Band doctor can tell you, chronic illnesses that are usually resolved after weight loss surgery include:
- Hypertension, or, high blood pressure
- Type II diabetes
- Sleep apnea
But the Lap Band help is being criticized Down Under because the police are undergoing a general belt-tightening ( financial belt tightening, unfortunately) and have already cut back on mobile phones, motorcycles and even patrol cars.
Australian researchers writing in Obesity Journal, surveyed 323 Lap Band patients three years after their surgery and found 91 percent would have the weight loss surgery again. (Read the Lap Band doctor article.)
In the U.S., police officers are often required to stay in shape. After all, a cop never knows when he or she must chase a bank robber on foot!
So news about overweight cops is constantly being made.
For instance, a five-foot-nine Bellevue, Nebraska, policeman, Chris Parent, was fired back in 2007 at 350 pounds because he just was not nimble enough.
The crunch? Parent took a combat course test requiring him to kneel, fire his sidearm at a target, move to another location and fire again. But the officer could not stand again after kneeling without grabbing onto something for support.
Parent battled his case through the Nebraska Supreme Court who ordered the officer reinstated in 2009 with full back pay.
In Thailand, 340 portly traffic cops are told to hit the gym, lose at least 10 pounds and get into shape within three months. A survey found 57 percent of the force is overweight, with high cholesterol and triglyceride levels.
The day might come when Lap Bands are as common as badges to police forces.
admin @ March 9, 2010
Tummy Tuck
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So many patients are undergoing weight loss surgery that one of the fastest growing areas of plastic surgery is removing excess skin.
It happens like this:
For many reasons – inactivity, bad eating habits, genetics – some people gain 100 to 150 and more pounds. Such a huge weight gain stretches the skin of the arm, legs, stomach, chest, neck and face far beyond its ability to rebound.
After weight loss surgery – like via a Lap Band – the result is still “plus sized,” skin hanging in sheets.
That’s a problem because the movement in almost any exercise causes the excess skin to painfully flap and rub against still other sheets of skin. That, in turn, often creates pain, infections and embarrassment.
Lap Band doctors have reported patients with enough loose skin hanging from their stomachs to reach the knees.
Due to massive weight loss (MWL), one of the most popular body shaping procedures to remove that excess skin is the tummy tuck, or abdominoplasty.
Plastic surgeons in Pittsburgh studied 490 MWL patients who had tummy tucks.
A regular tummy tuck just won’t remove enough skin. So the doctors and patients can choose from:
- A circumferential, or belt, abdominoplasty
The scar goes all the way around the body.
- A Fleur-de-lis abdominoplasty
The scar — only on the abdomen — is shaped like an inverted “T”.
Because the scars are longer and a few more complications could exist, the plastic surgeons, working at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, studied the results of 154 patients who had the Fleur-de-lis version.
Results? The doctors found the overall abdominal complication rate of all tummy tuck patients is about the same as the Fleur-de-lis group only.
The usual, expected complications in abdominoplasty include:
- Infections along the incision
- Seroma, a pocket of clear fluid that sometimes develops after surgery.
- The incision breaking open, known in medicine as dehiscence
- Being male is also a risk factor.
Concluded the surgeons:
- Fleur-de-lis can do a better job of removing excess skin on MWL patients who are left with a lot of hanging, loose skin on the upper abdomen.
- Complication rates are about the same as with traditional tummy tucks that use only one incision along the lower abdomen.
(Read the University of Pittsburgh plastic surgery study.)
admin @ March 4, 2010
Breast Augmentation
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It seems like a no-brainer, but Transform, an English cosmetic plastic surgery group, surveyed:
to discover that 50 percent of male study subjects look at a woman’s breasts before her face.
That’s no great shock to any woman who knows the feeling of a guy talking, not to her face, but to her breasts. Some even advise the man: “Hey, I’m up here!”
But here’s the unusual part of the study: many women are just as obvious, with 90 percent of the study group admitting they stare at and evaluate “the girls” of their friends, co-workers and relatives. Half the group of women surveyed also said they have “breast envy” when they spot a healthy and attractive bust line.
About 40 percent men of men said, of the women they are usually around, they, the men, check out the ladies’ cleavage at least ten times daily.
British plastic surgeons say that about half of English women are unhappy with their breasts, with 63 percent wanting breast augmentation.
Guys, however, would not to touch that question. Half said they would not want their partner to have breast enlargement or a breast lift.
But it’s not to say that men are mindless beasts. For, given human nature, men are just beasts.
Let us explain more.
Researchers at the University of Wellington in Australia performed a similar study and found 47 percent of men first looked at a woman’s décolletage while only 20 percent of first glances were on her face. Moreover, the glances at breasts lasted longer.
The move is hard wired into the brain – men are not responsible. Whether we realize it or not, virtually all of human attraction is due to the possibility of mating.
To prove it, the Australian scientists noted male subjects’ glances fell to the aspects of the hourglass figure within 0.2 seconds of the breast peep. Larger breast sizes and a slim waist indicate the woman has higher levels of estrogen and, thus, greater fertility. ll this may have been a good thing when very few humans dwelled on Earth.
And because our brains can actually overtake libido – given a little effort – wouldn’t it be a wonderful social lubricant if more men worked on developing their peripheral vision so they could look a lady in the eyes while admiring her nether regions?
admin @ March 2, 2010
Gynecomastia
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For the second year, gynecomastia surgery in the British Isles has increased. Of course, the numbers are a lot smaller because the U.K. population is smaller than that of the U.S.’s
For 2009, the rate of male breast reduction increased 80 percent over the previous year. And for 2008, that rate had increased over 2007.
According to the British Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons (BAAPS), 581 gynecomastia surgeries were counted in 2009 while 2008 saw 328.
Compare that with half a decade ago, when only 22 such surgeries were performed.
By comparison, male breast reduction in the U.S. was down 5.7 percent for 2008 when compared to the number of similar surgeries done in 2007. The American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS) –believe it or not! – says the decline was due to the economy.
Actually, readers of the CSI blog were already clued into some of the story. Back in January, 2009, the CSI blog reported on some suspected causes. (Read our blog about why gynecomastia has increased.)
The BAAPS also points out that, for British men, the following procedures increased 21 percent over last year’s rates, including:
- Rhinoplasty
- Eyelid lift surgery
- Liposuction
- Pinning back of large ears (otoplasty)
What could be going on?
According to some plastic surgery analysts and prognosticators, it’s the “Sarkozy effect” – a mini boom in male plastic surgery.
Sarkozy? (In New Orleans, they would say “Who dat?”)
Nicolas Sarkozy, the 50-ish president of France, married former supermodel Carla Bruni who is 13 years his junior.
Meanwhile, back in England, a cosmetic plastic surgery chain, The Harley Medical Group claims 50 percent more men than last year between 35 and 55 coming in for Botox.
Also, male microdermabrasion – a procedure much loved by women – is up 43 percent.
Face lifts are up 17 percent while chin lifts have increased 43 percent.
The new group of patients are being called FAMs (Forty or Fifty-year-old Alpha Males) by British plastic surgeons.
In addition to looking good, another trend is working when a FAM marries a woman young enough to be his daughter: he must be willing to start another family!
He is then known as a “Recycled Father”.
After a few years of diaper changing and the terrible twos, our FAM will then be ready for every rejuvenation procedure known to plastic surgeons!
admin @ February 26, 2010
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