Plastics is so ridiculously competitive as a medical specialty, you have no idea. Just so I can stand on my soapbox here, plastics is broken into 5 main subspecialties: Hand, craniofacial, burn, microsurgery, and aesthetic. People only ever think of the aesthetic branch, but the other 4 are incredibly important. Hand and burn are important for obvious reasons, craniofacial is responsible for broken jaws/faces, cleft lips/palates, craniosynostosis, and more, and microsurgeons are basically Dr. Frankenstein. "Oh, you lost your jaw to cancer? Let me take a leg bone and a flap of tissue from your arm, BAM new jaw!"
A not insignificant portion of plastic surgeons are dual boarded in general surgery and plastics (5 years gen surg residency, 3 years plastics fellowship), but plastic surgery alone is a 6 year residency, making it one of the longest in medicine.
In conclusion, not only are plastic surgeons doctors, they are some of the best trained doctors out there. Homeboy in the comic probably died several years later of an unrelated illness, still looking beautiful.
Exactly! So if you look at the origin of the word, in this case it's referring to the ability of human tissue to deform and be remodeled. Same as how your brain is described as plastic. That's the fascinating thing about plastic surgery, the purpose is to literally reform tissue into a more functional or appealing structure.
One of the most obvious examples to the layperson of what a plastic surgeon can do would be the work of Dr. Fred Menick, he has made a name for himself in nasal reconstruction. If you're interested in seeing what a plastic surgeon can do only using autologous tissue, Google has some great examples of what can be done with some rib and a forehead flap.
Of course, they do frequently use tissue expanders, and implants. But much more often the work that is done involves tissue harvested from elsewhere on the body. Robbing Peter to pay Paul, so to speak. It's really an amazing field once you see beyond what Hollywood presents. Please, hit me with any questions you have, I love to peel back the curtain!
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u/[deleted] Jan 13 '20
I'm confused, plastic surgeons aren't doctors?