Facelift

A facelift is a surgical procedure that eliminates visible signs of aging in the face and neck. A youthful face represents a more youthful person. The "layer approach" to a facelift is the most comprehensive. The most superficial layer of the face is the skin. A facelift procedure addresses the underlying layers of the face. Also known as rhytidectomy, a facelift smoothes the loose skin on the face and neck, tightens the underlying tissues and removes excess fat. New endoscopic techniques reduce scarring. A doctor uses a small endoscope measuring 5 mm in diameter and cuts into the scalp. The plastic surgeon performs the entire operation under the facial skin resulting in no visible scars on the face. Endoscopic facelifts have a quick recovery with the patient experiencing minimal bruising and swelling. Deeper soft tissues around the checks and eye make a patient look tired. Cheek fat removal techniques and spot facial or neck suctioning or buccal fat excision, remove excess cheek fat by a tiny incision inside the mouth. The procedure yields a more sculptured appearance. Cheek augmentation makes the cheek bones themselves seem wider or more forward appearing and the buccal fat excision removes fat from "chubby cheeks" below the bones. The doctor performs the surgery with a light general anesthesia and uses long-acting local anesthetics to minimize postoperative pain. The surgery begins with the injection of a long-acting local anesthetic to keep comfortable long after the procedure is over. If there is excess fat, the doctor liposuctions the neck and face and then makes incisions in front of the ear and behind the ear. The surgeon elevates the skin from the face to reveal the deeper SMAS layer. This layer of the face includes all of the muscles that produce facial expressions. The doctor pulls the skin upwards towards the scalp in order to correct the sagging effects of gravity on the face. The surgeon then re-drapes the skin of the face also pulling in an upward direction. Then, the surgeon closes the incisions in multiple layers, paying special attention to where the sutures are. The incisions behind the ears will be covered by the ear and therefore not visible. When a doctor performs a facelift endoscopically, the anesthesiologist anesthetizes the face. The surgeon hides the small incisions in the scalp and, using a special camera (endoscope) along with special endoscopic instruments, completes the entire procedure as displayed on a monitor. The doctor elevates the skin away from the SMAS layer and suspends it from the SMAS. The doctor tightens muscles and re-drapes the skin over the face. He or she suspends it in place with special sutures. The multiple-layer approach to facial rejuvenation yields long-lasting results. The doctor places surgical scars within the scalp so that they are not visible. The minimally invasive endoscopic approach allows for a speedy recovery and shorter "down time." In both procedures, the doctor covers the face with special bandages that lightly compress the skin after surgery in order to decrease any swelling.

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Personalized Medicine

Personalized medicine is a medical model emphasizing the systematic use of information about an individual patient to select or optimize that patient's preventative and therapeutic care. Personalized medicine is the products and services that leverage the science of genomics and proteomics and capitalize on the trends toward wellness and consumerism to enable tailored approaches to prevention and care. Over the past century, medical care has centered on standards of care based on epidemiological studies of large cohorts. Personalized medicine seeks to provide an objective basis for consideration of such individual differences. Traditionally, personalized medicine has been limited to the consideration of a patient's family history, social circumstances, environment, and behaviors in tailoring individual care. Personalized medicine uses new methods of molecular analysis to manage a patient’s disease or predisposition toward a disease. It aims to achieve optimal medical outcomes by helping physicians and patients choose the disease management approaches likely to work best in the context of a patient’s genetic and environmental profile. Such approaches may include genetic screening programs that more precisely diagnose diseases and their sub-types, or help physicians select the type and dose of medication best suited to a certain group of patients. Personalized medicine is an extension of traditional approaches to understanding and treating illness. Since the beginning of the study of medicine, physicians have employed evidence found through observation to make a diagnosis or to prescribe treatment. In the modern concept of personalized medicine, the tools provided to the physician are more precise, probing not just the obvious, such as a tumor on a mammogram or cells under a microscope, but the very molecular makeup of each patient. Looking at the patient on this level helps the physician get a profile of the patient’s genetic distinction, or mapping. By investigating this genetic mapping, medical professionals are then able to profile patients, and use the found information to plan a course of treatment that is much more in step with the way their body works. Genomic medicine and personalized medicine use genetic information to prevent or treat disease in adults or their children. Having a genetic map or a profile of a patient’s genetic variation can then guide the selection of drugs or treatment processes. This can minimize side effects or to create a strategy for a more successful outcome from the medical treatment. Helping the physician cover all the bases is imperative. Genetic mapping can also indicate the propensity to contract certain diseases before the patient actually shows recognizable symptoms, allowing the physician and patient to put together a plan for observation and prevention. Personalized medicine, when coupled with personal pharmacogenetics, is a unique approach that may be well suited for the health challenges we face in the new millennium. Although the medical and scientific communities, through research and discovery, got the upper hand over many of the diseases we have encountered since the advent of advanced medicine, many diseases that are more complicated. Diseases like diabetes, heart disease, cancer, and Alzheimer’s are caused by a combination of genetic and other factors. Coupled with the fact that they tend to be chronic, they place a significant burden on not only the patient, but on the healthcare system as a whole. Personalized medicine aims to provide the tools and knowledge to fight chronic diseases and treat them more effectively than ever before. Genetic profiles can help physicians to better discern subgroups of patients with various forms of cancer, in addition to other complex diseases, helping to guide doctors with accurate forms of predictive medicine and preventative medicine. With personalized medicine, the physician is intending to select the best treatment protocol or even, in many cases, avoid passing the expense and risks of unnecessary medical treatments on to the patient altogether. In addition, personalized medicine, when used correctly, aims to guide tests that detect variation in the way individual patients metabolize various pharmaceuticals. Personalized medicine is working to help determine the right dose for a patient, helping to avoid hazards based on familial history, environmental influences, and genetic variation.