I love stories because in a story I am able to convey a lot and make it memorable for a person.  I remember a couple of stories that involved the Transport Security Authority (TSA) at the airport.  I had one lady in whom I had done many fillers to make her face look a lot more youthful.  She had passed through the TSA and was stopped because her driver’s license, as the agent reported, looked like her grandmother.  She was not allowed through.

Another time, a patient of mine was passing through the TSA with her best high-school friend and the agent remarked, “Are you guys mother and daughter?”  They were of course born within a year or two of each other.  The point of these stories is that we all make very quick, snap judgments about another individual and we do so based on a summary of physical attributes.  My goal is to make a face look bright, balanced, youthful, more feminine for women and more masculine for men, and in a word more attractive.

We have talked before about Malcolm Gladwell’s book, Blink, in which we make summary judgments about one another in a blink of an eye.  My goal is to make one’s blink effect significantly better.  Why? Because honestly nothing else matters as much.  If the small parts of one’s face look a tad bit better but he or she still looks tired, sad, or unattractive then I have done little to help that person look better.  However, if one receives a lot of compliments from others then I have improved one’s “blink” in a measurable way.

Sam M. Lam, MD, FACS is a board certified plastic surgeon in Dallas, Texas. To schedule a consultation please call (972) 312-8188. To Learn more about Dr Lams’ plastic surgery procedures or to ask Dr Lam a question please visit his plastic surgery forum.

One of the biggest concerns that I have from prospective patients is that they not look weird, the fear stemming from seeing unnatural celebrities that are frightening to them in magazines and on television.  The question I get all the time is “If celebrity X has all the money in the world, how can she look so bad?”  Great question.  I think the answer is that the celebrity went to a physician who lacks artistic taste and therefore is incapable of seeing that his work is ugly.

In Nancy Etcoff’s book, Survival of the Prettiest, she talks about something called the “Uncanny Valley”.  On one side of the valley, we have normal-looking human beings that obviously do not garner any negative physical reaction from the average human viewer.  On the opposite side of the valley, we have things that do not look human at all like a robot, which also typically does not engender any negative sentiment.  In between, we have an “uncanny valley” in which we have quasi-looking humans that can create revulsion, fear, and dread in us.  That is why bad plastic surgery can elicit so many bad stares even though one may not be able to pinpoint exactly what is so “uncanny” about the person.  It is important as always when I see an individual that even when that person comes in for something else that I help him or her determine what would be the best procedure because sometimes one may not know one is already in the uncanny valley and certainly one should not be requesting a procedure that will land one in that dreadful valley.

Sam M. Lam, MD, FACS is a board certified plastic surgeon in Dallas, Texas. To schedule a consultation please call (972) 312-8188. To Learn more about Dr Lams’ plastic surgery procedures or to ask Dr Lam a question please visit his plastic surgery forum.

Survival of the Prettiest Part 2:  Do Blondes Have More Fun?

As a follow-up to the blog on how we relate to babies, Nancy Etcoff in her book, Survival of the Prettiest, argues that men are more attracted to blonde women than to darker haired women, whereas women are attracted to the polar opposite, i.e., a darker-shaded male.  The reason that she argues that men are more attracted to fairer-skinned women is that men are more attracted to younger women who are in turn more fertile in nature and women are naturally lighter in color when they are younger when estrogens levels are higher.  Women, on the other hand, are attracted to men who are darker in shade because men have naturally a higher hemoglobin content that is closer to the skin making men naturally darker.  Are all men attracted to fairer-skinned women and are all women attracted to darker-complected men?  Obviously, the answer is no; and I am not trying to be racist.  As you know, I am Asian so I am not trying to betray my own race but just reporting some of Etcoff’s thoughts, which I find fascinating whether they are 100% accurate or not.  Along those lines, women are deemed more attractive when they appear younger, which is perhaps the single most primary drive that I have in my business is to make women appear more youthful.  I know most women come in and declare up front, “Doctor, I am not trying to look 20.” And I get that.  I understand that my goal is not to try to make a woman look ridiculous.  However, with that being said, I do try to shoot for as much youth as I can attain within reason since it is a vital factor in building attraction from other men and women alike.  If we forget wrinkles and jowls and other specific facial features, the larger goal is to make a face look more attractive to another person viewing it and thereby build self-confidence and related happiness.  Happiness from looking better?  Is that possible?  In Jonathan Haidt’s book, The Happiness Hypothesis, he argues that good plastic surgery can actually bring years of happiness to an individual.

Sam M. Lam, MD, FACS is a board certified plastic surgeon in Dallas, Texas. To schedule a consultation please call (972) 312-8188. To Learn more about Dr Lams’ plastic surgery procedures or to ask Dr Lam a question please visit his plastic surgery forum.

Survival of the Prettiest Part 1:  Babies and Attraction

I am reading Nancy Etcoff’s book, Survival of the Prettiest, and recommend it to all as a good read for someone who wants to understand the biological impetus for our desire for all things pretty.  I heard Ms. Etcoff speak in Washington D.C. at our annual Fall Meeting of the American Academy of Facial Plastic & Reconstructive Surgery (AAFPRS) and found her talk riveting.

One thing that I thought particularly interesting is how we relate to babies and how babies relate to us.  Studying mothers who had more attractive babies found that they would spend more time with the baby staring at him or her, whereas those mothers who had less attractive babies would still spend considerable time with them but would be engaged in busy work that did not involve mindless staring at the child.  Even more fascinating is how babies respond to attractive adult faces as compared to unattractive ones.  Babies would stare for significantly longer periods of time at attractive faces and much less time at those faces deemed unattractive.

As humans, we are hardwired to be attracted to beauty.  Women were given photographs of beautiful and unattractive men and women, and they stared for exceptionally longer times at the beautiful people, both at the men and the women.  Men, on the other hand, only stared longer at the beautiful women.  Despite these gender differences, you can see we are all attracted to beauty at a subconscious and conscious level.  This is why what I do is so important because my objective in my work is to build attraction at a fundamental social and professional level because that is what is important when it comes to spending your hard-earned money on cosmetic services.

Sam M. Lam, MD, FACS is a board certified plastic surgeon in Dallas, Texas. To schedule a consultation please call (972) 312-8188. To Learn more about Dr Lams’ plastic surgery procedures or to ask Dr Lam a question please visit his plastic surgery forum.

Knowing Yourself and Your Plastic Surgeon:  Clasping Your Hands and Determining If You Are Right-Brained or Left-Brained

My Allergan business-development representative conducted a wonderful leadership seminar in my office that gave my staff a rousing and thoughtful view on leadership.  A fun exercise that we did was to clasp our fingers together like in prayer taking care to note whether our right or left thumb sat naturally over the other. In my case my left thumb sat over my right thumb, which reportedly indicates that my right brain is more dominant, signifying artistry and creativity.

As I have emphasized in other blogs, I believe that an artistic temperament and overall sensibility must be a defining element to an aesthetic surgeon.  Too often I see work that is plain ugly because the surgeon was technically gifted but lacked a sense of taste.  When the work is shaped poorly and designed hideously, it does not matter how good the physician is because the result is ugly.  Failing to see the overall design of the result is one of the biggest mistakes that a surgeon can commit since a part of the face may look somewhat better but when it does not match the integrity of the entire face the result is off kilter.  Balance, discretion, and decorum all are important elements to the composite result.

Sam M. Lam, MD, FACS is a board certified plastic surgeon in Dallas, Texas. To schedule a consultation please call (972) 312-8188. To Learn more about Dr Lams’ plastic surgery procedures or to ask Dr Lam a question please visit his plastic surgery forum.