These behaviors anger me because all of my life, I have always striven to "do the right thing"; to heed Ben Franklin's advice that "Anything worth doing is worth doing well".
I worked hard- to be sure I got into the best medical school, then one of the very best plastic surgery training programs- to excel in my Board Certification Exams, etc... To do all of the things that would make me the best plastic surgeon I could possibly be. It was a tremendous amount of work over a very long time, but the sense of fulfillment and satisfaction I get from my profession is immeasurable and makes it all worth it.
Because of the tremendous amount of work and time spent achieving these accomplishments, I take my oaths and responsibilities extremely seriously, to my patients, to the community I live in, and to my colleagues. I am proud to be a Board Certified Plastic Surgeon, and strongly agree with the principles outlined in our Code of Ethics.
Yet it is precisely because of the integrity and determination with which I pursued my accomplishments and dreams that I feel so outraged by the frequently immoral, unethical, and overtly fraudulent nature of many of the advertisements I see for "providers" of plastic surgery services in Central Florida.
It seems everyone with an MD now believes that a monetary investment in a liposuction machine and a few days or weeks training makes it okay to market themselves as liposuction experts. To sometimes disastrous (for the patient) effect.
This week, I came across several ads for an ER doctor marketing them as an aesthetic specialist.
I must say that in all of the time I spent in ERs at The Johns Hopkins Hospital and at Barnes Hospital (both consistently listed in the top 10 of American hospitals), I never once witnessed, participated in, or was required to perform liposuction.
In my opinion, telling prospective patients that you are an expert in liposuction because you had enough money to buy the machine and the manufacturer was willing to sell it to you (an ER doctor) does not make you a liposuction expert. It makes you something else.
Elase medical spas is a business owned by a local entrepreneur who has now contracted with a couple of local plastic surgeons to provide plastic surgical services in the spas... Let's be clear here- I have nothing against honest people doing their best to make an honest living.
The practices that Elase Medical Spas are engaging in, however, are not exactly honest. Their recent advertising shows many photos of very nice results under a heading suggesting that the patients shown are their own and are clearly very satisfied.
The funny thing is that I recognized many of the photos shown as the photos presented during sales pitches by the representatives of the machines used... Meaning that the outcomes in the photos were NOT produced at Elase Medical Spas... This was confirmed when I spoke to a colleague who's patients I recognized among these photos.
What do these behaviors say about the character of these physicians?
Unfortunately, there are a great many other examples... The Florida Board of Medicine this month disciplined a Tampa physician named Dr. Yves N. Jean-Baptiste because it was discovered that he was registering patients for liposuction in his office that was then performed by his (totally untrained) office staff!
I cannot imagine a set of circumstances where this would be acceptable. The fact that the physician in question is a Family Medicine doctor, NOT trained in plastic surgery or liposuction (other than the 3 days of training provided by the person who sold him the machine) just makes it worse.
On the other hand, I believe that it is because he was not a trained plastic surgeon that this occurred.
In other words, BECAUSE my thorough and lengthy training in Plastic Surgery gave me the knowledge and respect of the anatomy and procedures I perform, I would NEVER allow one of my staff to perform liposuction on one of my patients.
BECAUSE of the determination, work, and character it took to earn the credentials I proudly display in my office, on my letterhead, and on my profile at this site, I would NEVER disgrace myself, those credentials, or the institutions which granted them in order to deceive others (whom I am supposed to be serving and helping) into bringing me their business. I know this is conviction most of my colleagues with legitimate credentials would share.
These illegitimate and/or unscrupulous "providers", and others like them, are comfortable compromising their oaths, their morals, and their ethics BECAUSE their credentials are less valuable to them (having come by these easily), or because they would simply stoop lower than most to achieve a less than legitimate gain.
Thomas Paine wrote, "What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly"....
So what does this behavior say about these "providers"? And the real question is- would you want to put your safety and happiness in the hands of someone with those traits?
It offends me that these dishonest and predatory people with MDs continue to damage not only their own reputations, but necessarily also those of the procedures they are performing, and those legitimate and trained, honest and ethical, Board Certified Plastic Surgeons.
I cringe each time I see a patient who looks and feels like she has been attacked by a shark (most recently in a patient who had undergone "Aqualipo" at the office of a local eye doctor) because I know that in addition to thinking negative things about the person who did it to her, she is also thinking that liposuction in general is a bad thing, and probably also that all providers of liposuction are less than honest people willing to do anything for a few dollars.
There are decent, honest, competent, skilled, and ethical Board Certified Plastic Surgeons available to you- but unfortunately not all doctors are honest, ethical people anymore.
ADDENDUM 8/25/10
I have received communication from Dr. Christopher Prevel, one of the surgeons at Elase Medical Spas, informing me that he was not aware of the photos being used in the advertisements for his services, because they were placed by the owner of Elase Medical spas without his knowledge, and that he does not therefore feel responsible for the deception these photos represent, although he regrets the confusion they may have caused. He has made it clear that this will not occur in future ads for himself or for Elase, and this can only be considered a positive development.
I apologize for assuming a physician would be aware of the details of marketing efforts being made in his name (right?), commend Dr. Prevel for responding so quickly and responsibly to this problem, and for appropriately taking responsibility for his future advertising.
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