The decision to get plastic surgery is huge. Maybe you’ve spent hours researching, talking to friends and loved ones, and going back and forth with your decision. If you’re being thorough and intentional about your decision for surgery, we applaud you for putting your health and happiness first!
To hopefully help your research process along, the Indian Hills Plastic Surgery team compiled a list of 5 things you shouldn’t settle without when researching practices that offer cosmetic surgery near you.
1. Credentials
Of course one of the first things you should look for is the credentials and experience of the surgeon and team members. Make sure your plastic surgeon is board-certified by the American Board of Plastic Surgery. Accredited plastic surgeons have to go through medical school, a plastic surgery residency program, and extensive written and oral examinations to achieve board-certification.
Besides the surgeon, figure out what other individuals will be helping you before, during, and after surgery. What are their credentials? How long has each of the team members been in practice? Any incredible plastic surgery practice would be happy to provide you with these answers.
2. In-depth consultation process
Once you’ve ensured that your practice of choice has an expert team, you’ll next want to find out what their consultation process is like. If there’s nothing about it on their website, You could either schedule your consultation to find out or call and ask.
When it comes to looking for cosmetic surgery near you, avoid a place that doesn’t offer multiple appointment opportunities for a consultation. For example, at our practice, we encourage patients to come in for as many consultations as they’d like before committing to surgery. .
For a breast augmentation, this multiple appointment consultation might look something like this:
- A simple conversation discussing needs and wants.
- The patient looks at and gets to hold the different implant sizes.
- The patient chooses their implant sizes and discusses their goals in more detail.
Above all else, make sure you don’t have to pay anything for your consultations and that your surgeon is actually listening to you and making you feel comfortable.
3. Individualized care
The next thing you shouldn’t settle without when looking for cosmetic surgery in Tuscaloosa is individualized care. Your anatomy and goals are unique to you—a reputable cosmetic surgeon will offer individualized care for every patient. Even if you want the same procedure as 100 other patients, that doesn’t mean the surgical process or treatment plan should be identical every time.
Trust your instincts! You can tell when someone understands you and makes you feel heard; ensure your care plan reflects that and matches up with your needs.
Related: Patient-Focused Tuscaloosa Plastic Surgeon
4. Routine follow-ups
In the same vein as the in-depth consultation process, cosmetic surgery near you should provide free routine follow-up sessions to check on your progress. One follow-up appointment isn’t enough. At Indian Hills Plastic Surgery, Dr. Wallace likes to see her patients multiple times in the first year of surgery to ensure recovery is going as expected. If your surgeon doesn’t offer follow-ups or just offers one follow-up session, keep looking!
5. Before and afters
Lastly, make sure you’re checking your surgeon’s work. You’ll want to see real patient results so you can know what to expect for your own surgery. Take a look at their before and after gallery and even peruse some patient reviews to make sure you’re in excellent hands.
Still searching for the right cosmetic surgery near you?
At Indian Hills, we treat everyone like the individual they are and consistently provide comprehensive, personalized care. No stress and no pressure ever; let’s just meet and go from there!
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