WOW!+�-� I have to make major decisions on several key entertainment items that, I believe, will have significant impact on my career.+�-� It’s so strange that it’s not enough to be a highly trained, skilled, experienced Plastic & Cosmetic Surgeon…you have to be media savvy and camera ready as well.
I actually have taken the role as a teacher and beauty advisor to the general public.+�-� I do it for all of my patients so why not for everyone.+�-� That’s the basis for my appearances on TV, my articles in Magazines and the TV show projects that really interest me the most.+�-� I want you, to see quality…experienced…balanced images of+�-�a Plastic & Cosmetic Surgeon.+�-� I want you, as consumers to be well informed about the wonderous things that are available and have a good idea of what types of things will make you more attractive…that’s why I came up with my “Palmer Beauty Principles”.+�-� But there is so much more to my career and life.
+�-�I want you to try and imagine a typical day in my life.+�-� I have breakfast with my family, like many people do everyday and I come to the office.+�-� In consultation I see people with one thing on their mind…”how can they become more attractive.”+�-� Whether it’s their first surgery or a revision, that’s the gist of our conversation.+�-� People, as you can imagine run the entire gambit from very sweet to downright belligerent..from reasonable to completely unreasonable (in their expectations) and from easy to improve to next to impossible.+�-� I need to compassionately deal with all of them in the best way that I know how.+�-� How do I do that?+�-� Very early in my career, as I grappled with those questions, I decided that the best way for me to handle every patient was to simply “tell them the truth as if they were one of my family.”+�-� So that’s what I have always done and it has served me well over the past 16 years that I have been in practice.+�-� I further decided to teach every patient, during consultation about their own unique beauty and exactly how…and why…I would improve their appearance.+�-� What comes out of all this exchange is a customized list of possible ways to make them more attractive based on their unique situation.+�-� That’s the easy part…the psychological part and the teaching…the difficult part, as you can imagine, is doing the surgery.
+�-�When I was a resident surgeon training at LA County USC Medical Center, one of the World’s largest ( and busiest) teaching institutions I used to comment that “surgery is stressful.”+�-� I’m sure that comes as no surprise to anyone but the level of stress can’t be imagined unless you have ever done surgery.+�-� Imagine walking into a room with several other people all waiting for you to begin.+�-� The patient is asleep, draped and prepped and the Scrub Tech hands you a scalpel.+�-� You take the scalpel and cut into the skin of the face or body and it starts to bleed.+�-� In between, stopping the bleeding with an electrical cautery device, you continue to lift and separate the tissues with scissors.+�-� Most of the time, important things like nerves and large vessels are where they are supposed to be…but not always…so your concentration can’t wane…not even for a second.+�-� You’re hesitant to even blink but yet you must continue….you are the moving force of this event and without priogress, on your part, the surgery won’t get done.+�-� You press on…dealing with micro changes in the tissues at a continuous rate, adjusting what you do based on the sensory feedback received through+�-�touch, sight and sound.+�-� You try not to think about this patients’ wishes, hopes or her/his family as this takes away from the the level of concentration needed to press forward.+�-� You remain alert and incredibly focused.+�-�
+�-�This goes on for as long as it needs to continue for you to complete the surgery to your satisfaction…you then breath easilly…you are finished.+�-� It’s been said that all great surgeons perform each and every operation a minimum of 3 times.+�-� Once in their head before the surgery starts, during the actual surgery and once again after the surgery is completed in their head to see if there was anything…anything that could have been done better.+�-� I find truth to that saying, but I have always done that ..plus prayed for my patients before…during and after the surgery.+�-�
+�-�How do you deal with all this pressure…I can’t speak for all Plastic & Cosmetic Surgeons but I get strength from having a clear aesthetic plan, for each patient, before I ever pick up that scalpel, from the confidence that I know what I am doing…and what I have to do to accomplish my aesthetic goals for this patient, in the experience that I have gained from 18 years of doing similar operations on others and the strength from saying a prayer to God to guide my hands during the operation.+�-� With all of these things, I find the confidence and strength to pick up the scalpel, make that cut and move through the surgery to completion…while I chat with the OR personnel or relax listening to music making it look effortless and easy.+�-� Pressure…what Pressure?
This is what goes on behind the scenes when you have a Rhinoplasty, Face Lift, Brow Lift, Blepharoplasty, Breast Augmentation, Lip Augmentation, Cheek or Chin Implants or a Tummy Tuck.+�-� Each of these Plastic and Cosmetic Surgery Procedures has its own skill set, you have to get into the correct frame of mind whether you’re working on the average Joan, a captain of industry or a major celebrity.
Dr. Francis R Palmer, III
