Speaker 1: Guess what, well, what's that mango? So, have you ever
Speaker 1: heard of poker talks.
Speaker 2: Poker talks, is that like dtox for playing poker? Or what?
Speaker 2: I actually not heard of it.
Speaker 1: It's actually botox for playing poker.
Speaker 2: Oh, I get it. That's smart. Yeah.
Speaker 1: It was invented by this New York City doctor. His
Speaker 1: name is Jack Birdie, and he's also this poker player,
Speaker 1: and he realized the biggest problem for poker players is
Speaker 1: there tells like people who like fire their brows or
Speaker 1: curl their lips as they're trying to bluff, and so
Speaker 1: he basically came up with a few places to administer
Speaker 1: botox so you don't show your hand as much.
Speaker 2: Now, I'm guessing this is just for humans, or can
Speaker 2: you know those dogs that play poker? Can they also
Speaker 2: get this treatment?
Speaker 1: I love the idea of like Sharpei or one of
Speaker 1: those like super wrinkly dogs just getting all smoothed out.
Speaker 1: Think of the bowtops. I feel like it'll take so
Speaker 1: many years off the dog. But hearing about Poker Talks
Speaker 1: treatments really made us wonder, like, what what's the history
Speaker 1: of these cosmetic procedures? How long have people been getting
Speaker 1: those jobs? And why was the Civil War such a
Speaker 1: turning point for plastic surgery? So let's dive in.
Speaker 2: Hey, their podcast listeners, Welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm
Speaker 2: Will Pearson and as always I'm joined by my good
Speaker 2: friend mangesh Hot Ticketer and on the other side of
Speaker 2: the soundproof glass really feeling that burned because he's doing
Speaker 2: his daily set of Facer sizes. I don't know if
Speaker 2: you've noticed this man, he's been doing them all week.
Speaker 1: I didn't.
Speaker 2: Well, that is our friends and producer Tristan McNeil.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 2: Tristan claims these exercises are a viable alternative to plastic surgery,
Speaker 2: something about how like toning your face muscles can make
Speaker 2: you look younger. So good luck to you, Tristan. You're
Speaker 2: already pretty young looking. But you know, we'll see if
Speaker 2: this makes a difference. And honestly, from here, it mostly
Speaker 2: looks like he's just kind of smushing his cheeks and
Speaker 2: making this little turtle face. It's kind of I wish
Speaker 2: everybody could see this. It's a little weird.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So he was trying to explain this to me earlier.
Speaker 1: He's been doing this old nineties exercise routine that's supposed
Speaker 1: to tighten facial muscles. And he said it's called cheek energizing,
Speaker 1: and supposedly it's part of this whole facer size program
Speaker 1: that this doctor named Carol Maggio developed like thirty years ago.
Speaker 1: It all sounds and looks pretty bizarre, and I mostly
Speaker 1: just impressed that Tristan was able to decode the written instructions.
Speaker 1: So I actually look this up, and this is a
Speaker 1: breakdown of the cheek energizer move he's been doing. Quote,
Speaker 1: place an index finger lightly on the top of each cheek. Now,
Speaker 1: smile with the middle of your upper lip while thinking
Speaker 1: about the expression you pulling the top lip flat against
Speaker 1: your teeth. Keep your upper and lower lips firmly pulling
Speaker 1: away from each other, and feel your cheeks move under
Speaker 1: your index fingers. Repeat this, smile and release. I mean,
Speaker 1: none of this makes any sense to mew.
Speaker 2: It feels weird. I don't know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'll only smile in the middle of your lip.
Speaker 2: Okay, Oh got bad. Bad.
Speaker 1: What's strange is that if we wanted, we could actually,
Speaker 1: like ask the inventor herself about how to do this.
Speaker 1: At age seventy three, she actually promotes facer size on
Speaker 1: Skype and you can do a Skype session with her
Speaker 1: and she'll walk you through it face to face.
Speaker 2: I am totally gonna do this manga. That just sounds
Speaker 2: weird enough for me to want to do it, and
Speaker 2: it does seem like it'ld be a pretty surreal experience.
Speaker 2: But as proponents of plastic surgery will tell you, most
Speaker 2: improvements from facial exercise just don't hold a candle to
Speaker 2: the results you get from a shot of botox or
Speaker 2: maybe a half hour under the knife. And when you
Speaker 2: think about it, that relative ease and the immediacy of
Speaker 2: the results, it's what makes cosmetic procedures so appealing in
Speaker 2: the first place. For instance, in twenty seventeen alone, fifteen
Speaker 2: point seven million minimally invasive cosmetic procedures were performed in
Speaker 2: the US, So we're talking about things like botox injections,
Speaker 2: chemical peels, laser hair removals. That's almost two hundred percent
Speaker 2: increase since the year two thousand. Now. Obviously a big
Speaker 2: reason for that growth is that cosmetic procedures have become easier,
Speaker 2: less invasive, you know, than they were in the year's past.
Speaker 2: But millions of people are lining up each year to
Speaker 2: have parts of their bodies nipped and tucked and shaped
Speaker 2: and plumped. But you know, whether or not that's a
Speaker 2: good thing is still kind of up in the air
Speaker 2: for many people. And so with that question of mine,
Speaker 2: we foind it be interesting to look into the history
Speaker 2: of plastic surgery, including how and why it got started
Speaker 2: and many of the ways it's changed over the years,
Speaker 2: And then a little bit later in the episode, I
Speaker 2: think we'll check out some of the more recent trends
Speaker 2: in the industry, as well as how a selfie stick
Speaker 2: might make you think twice about getting a nose job.
Speaker 1: That's right, But you know, before we get into any
Speaker 1: of that, I thought we could start by breaking down
Speaker 1: some of the terms we'll be using today, you know,
Speaker 1: just so things don't get confusing a little bit later.
Speaker 1: So in general, we refer to the term plastic surgery
Speaker 1: for a few time diferent things at once. You know,
Speaker 1: they're cosmetic surgeries, which are the ones meant to enhance
Speaker 1: a person's overall appearance and aren't considered medically necessary, so
Speaker 1: things like liposeuction or facelifts, as well as the less
Speaker 1: invasive procedures you mentioned like chemical peels and botox. But
Speaker 1: plastic surgery can also refer to reconstructive surgeries, and those
Speaker 1: are the ones performed to restore the normal function or
Speaker 1: appearance of a person's body, and for the most part,
Speaker 1: these are considered medically necessary.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean there are several of these types. When
Speaker 2: you think about surgeries like you know, repairing a cleft
Speaker 2: palate or the you know, unbelievable jobs that these surgeons
Speaker 2: can do when they're reconstructing a burn victim's face or
Speaker 2: their body, it's pretty remarkable how far this has come.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I did think it was worth mentioning because
Speaker 1: there's still a ton of stigma surrounding the term, Like
Speaker 1: lots of people only associate plastic surgery with the cosmetic
Speaker 1: side of things like tummy talks and calf implants.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, my guess is that the stigma has a
Speaker 2: lot to do with the word plastic itself. I mean,
Speaker 2: I think it makes people think about fakeness and artificiality
Speaker 2: and all the other things we associate with plastic as
Speaker 2: a substance, Like we wrap our view of plastic as
Speaker 2: being cheap and disposable onto these surgeries that share this name,
Speaker 2: which of course is pretty unfair when you really think
Speaker 2: about it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, especially when you consider that the name
Speaker 1: doesn't have anything to do with plastic in the first place.
Speaker 1: Like I read this week that the first time the
Speaker 1: word plastic was actually used to describe a surgical technique
Speaker 1: was in eighteen thirty seven, which is so long before
Speaker 1: plastic the substance was even invented.
Speaker 2: All right, So then what did the term actually mean
Speaker 2: when it was used in eighteen thirty seven.
Speaker 1: It actually came from the Greek word plasticos, which means
Speaker 1: to mold or give form. So a plastic surgery was
Speaker 1: basically a shaping surgery, and that was pretty fitting because
Speaker 1: the earliest forms of plastic surgery were based much more
Speaker 1: in reconstruction than they were in purely cosmetic changes.
Speaker 2: You know, It's interesting. This is another one of those
Speaker 2: things that when we started looking into the history, you
Speaker 2: really don't think about how far back some of these
Speaker 2: things go. And so actually, the earliest known example of
Speaker 2: plastic surgery dates all the way back to the sixth
Speaker 2: century BCE, and it was indeed a form of reconstruction.
Speaker 2: This was a nose job. The technique was invented in
Speaker 2: ancient India by a physician and a surgeon named Soushruta.
Speaker 2: And this was at the time when you know, it
Speaker 2: was common to punish an adulter or a thief with
Speaker 2: some form of body mutilation, usually by cutting off the
Speaker 2: nose or maybe an ear. And so this physician was
Speaker 2: one of many in the region who felt that this
Speaker 2: was a kind of public shaming and was just way
Speaker 2: over the line of course, and you know, basically ensured
Speaker 2: that the criminals would be shunned for the rest of
Speaker 2: their lives. We wanted to do something to help solve
Speaker 2: this problem, and so it began looking for a way
Speaker 2: to help these people reintegrate into society by restoring their
Speaker 2: appearance as much as he possibly could. And so what
Speaker 2: he came up with was this technique where a flap
Speaker 2: of skin was removed from a patient's cheek and then
Speaker 2: molded and shaped into a new nose the nostrils by
Speaker 2: inserting these two hollow reeds, and then you'd leave them
Speaker 2: in place to make sure the nostrils didn't close up
Speaker 2: as the new nose healed. I mean, it's unbelievable that
Speaker 2: somebody could pull this off that long ago.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it almost sounds like fantastical that anything like
Speaker 1: that could even work.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it seems to have been the consensus at the
Speaker 2: time too. But you know, once word of this method spread,
Speaker 2: other Indian surgeons began trying it for themselves, and some
Speaker 2: even put their own spin on the procedure by building
Speaker 2: the replacement nose from a flap of the patient's forehead
Speaker 2: skin rather than you know, maybe their cheek. And this
Speaker 2: early form of rhinoplasty proved so successful that it was
Speaker 2: eventually adapted throughout Europe, where it became known as the
Speaker 2: Indian method.
Speaker 1: So I had actually heard about this Indian method just
Speaker 1: because it's one of those things I feel is compulsory
Speaker 1: if you're Indian, like for an Indian pride, Like you know,
Speaker 1: India also came up with the concept of zero as
Speaker 1: a number and invented shampoo. Like these are just things
Speaker 1: we know, and you are welcome. But so apparently we
Speaker 1: weren't the only invaders there. There was also something called
Speaker 1: the Italian method, and this was emitted by a surgeon
Speaker 1: named Antonio Branca. This was in early fourteen hundreds, and
Speaker 1: the big difference was that Bronca used a flap of
Speaker 1: skin from the upper arm to build his patient's new noses,
Speaker 1: and this was considered an improvement for the most part
Speaker 1: because it left a lot less scarring than the Indian
Speaker 1: method did. The only downside was that, and this is
Speaker 1: a little strange to think about, in order for the
Speaker 1: skin to fully attach itself, patients actually had to hold
Speaker 1: their arms against their nose for like twenty straight days.
Speaker 1: Obviously seems super uncomfortable.
Speaker 2: It does sound miserable, but I guess in these cases,
Speaker 2: you know, considering the results or the payoff, I guess
Speaker 2: it was considered worth it. But yeah, let's get back
Speaker 2: to Shushruta for a minute. Because after his breakthrough, this
Speaker 2: plastic surgery continued to develop throughout Europe. So, for example,
Speaker 2: ancient Rome got in on the act sometime during the
Speaker 2: early first century, so surgeons of the era pioneered bleferoplasty,
Speaker 2: which is the adjustment of the eyelids in order to
Speaker 2: correct drooping or squinting eyes. And around the same time,
Speaker 2: the Greek physician Galen performed the very first purely cosmetic
Speaker 2: plastic surgery, so it was kind of like a nose
Speaker 2: job for the wealthy.
Speaker 1: It's kind of cool that those jobs were like first
Speaker 1: both for reconstructive and cosmetic purposes. It's kind of stunning,
Speaker 1: but you know, not everyone was happy about those breakthroughs
Speaker 1: and body modification. As Christianity began to take hold in
Speaker 1: Europe during the Middle Ages, plenty of religious leaders viewed
Speaker 1: plastic surgery as sinful or almost borderline blasphemous, and this
Speaker 1: belief gained more traction in the twelfth century when the
Speaker 1: Pope I think it's Pope Innocent the third at the time,
Speaker 1: he formally spoke out against it, and pretty soon after
Speaker 1: it became a crime to surgically alter the human body.
Speaker 2: So you see this kind of thing happen throughout history,
Speaker 2: but in this case, like what changed that perception? What
Speaker 2: made the church eventually back down from this.
Speaker 1: This is going to sound strange, but a lot of
Speaker 1: the shift was due to syphilis.
Speaker 2: Really, you know that there were a lot of things
Speaker 2: I was guessing about. Is not what I expected you
Speaker 2: to say, though.
Speaker 1: I know. So there was a really bad outbreak of
Speaker 1: this disease in Europe during the late sixteenth century, and
Speaker 1: one of the symptoms of advanced syphilis happens to be
Speaker 1: soft tissue decay, which is usually centered in the nose.
Speaker 1: I had no idea about this. But now there were
Speaker 1: all these like upper crust lords and ladies with these big,
Speaker 1: gaping holes in their faces, and suddenly this like quote
Speaker 1: sin of like crafting a false nose, it started to
Speaker 1: seem a whole lot better, you know than the alternative
Speaker 1: of having, you know, a hole in your face.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean that makes sense. And yeah, of course,
Speaker 2: plastic surgeries development didn't end in Europe, and the techniques
Speaker 2: eventually made their way here to the United States, with
Speaker 2: one of the earliest practitioners being doctor John Metdouer. You know,
Speaker 2: he and his sons ran this successful practice in Virginia
Speaker 2: and they were specializing and repairing genital birth effects and
Speaker 2: then later on in reconstructive surgery, and his legacy is
Speaker 2: actually really impressive. So Metour is credited with performing the
Speaker 2: first hard cleft palette repair on the Americas in eighteen
Speaker 2: twenty seven, and notably, he completed the procedure by transplanting
Speaker 2: pieces of bone rather than just skin or muscle as
Speaker 2: previous surgeons had done. And so this new technique was
Speaker 2: this huge leap forward for reconstructive surgery, and it's actually
Speaker 2: the main reason why doctor Metour is often called America's
Speaker 2: first plastic surgeon.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so it really seems like the nineteenth century is
Speaker 1: when modern plastic surgery really started to take off. And
Speaker 1: I was reading about how much of a game changer
Speaker 1: the Civil War was for battlefield medicine. I mean, you
Speaker 1: think about things like amputation techniques or more reliable forms
Speaker 1: of anesthesia, but facial reconstruction was another area that saw
Speaker 1: these major advances during America's bloodiest war, and records actually
Speaker 1: show that Union surgeons performed more than thirty successful plastic
Speaker 1: surgeries on these odd disfigured soldiers during the war, and
Speaker 1: they also pioneered new techniques that would later become standards
Speaker 1: in the field, like taking photo to track the progress
Speaker 1: of repairs and also using smaller sutures for incisions to
Speaker 1: help minimize the scarring. Yeah.
Speaker 2: You know, it's interesting how these advancements happened during war,
Speaker 2: because it actually wasn't just the Civil War where these
Speaker 2: kinds of breakthroughs happen, like both world wars actually also
Speaker 2: brought major innovations the plastic surgery as well.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, that's definitely a good point, and we
Speaker 1: should spotlight a few of those advances before we talk
Speaker 1: about the state of plastic surgery today. But before we
Speaker 1: go any further, why don't we take a quick break.
Speaker 1: You're listening to Part Time Genius and we're talking about
Speaker 1: the long, surprising history of plastic surgery. Okay, well, so
Speaker 1: we're up to the twentieth century now in our timeline,
Speaker 1: and we were just about to get into World War One.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right. You know, as we were saying, earlier
Speaker 2: wars have certainly led to these turning points and you know,
Speaker 2: reconstruction of various kinds and facial reconstruction specifically. And there
Speaker 2: were a couple of reasons for this. I mean, if
Speaker 2: you think about what was advanced in terms of warfare
Speaker 2: at that time, you had machine guns and aerial bombers
Speaker 2: that were being used in combat and really for the
Speaker 2: first time during World War One. And the result of this, obvious,
Speaker 2: you know, tragic result of this is that more soldiers
Speaker 2: suffered facial wounds due to bullets and shrapnel than in
Speaker 2: any of the wars before them. And you know, it's
Speaker 2: obviously awful, but the wounds were often more extensive than
Speaker 2: surgeons were used to treating. So the good news here
Speaker 2: is though, that anesthesia and the treatment of infections had
Speaker 2: definitely improved drastically by this time, so you had serious
Speaker 2: injuries that would have been fatal in the past that
Speaker 2: were now considered survivable, and that included a lot of
Speaker 2: major facial disfigurements as a result of this.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we mentioned earlier that there were some like thirty
Speaker 1: odd plastic surgeries during the Civil War, and that actually
Speaker 1: doesn't sound like that many at first, but when you
Speaker 1: consider how many soldier died just because there was no
Speaker 1: way to stave off infection, it starts to make sense
Speaker 1: why the number was so low.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And so with World War One, surgeons suddenly found
Speaker 2: themselves with a lot of chances to develop and refine
Speaker 2: new ways to deal with disfigurements. And one member of
Speaker 2: the medical community was especially helpful in this regard. His
Speaker 2: name was doctor Harold Gillies, and he was actually a nose,
Speaker 2: ear and throat specialists. He was from New Zealand and
Speaker 2: so he had joined the Royal Army Medical Corps at
Speaker 2: the start of the war, and so during his time
Speaker 2: on the Western Front, Gillies learned as much as he
Speaker 2: could about reconstructive surgery, and this was mostly by observing
Speaker 2: the dentists and the doctors that he was stationed with.
Speaker 2: So then when he returns to England, he was actually
Speaker 2: given the chance to apply what he'd learned to the
Speaker 2: newly opened Queen's Hospital in London. There were more than
Speaker 2: a thousand beds there and these were reserved for patients
Speaker 2: in need of these facial reconstructions, so it was a
Speaker 2: ton of people.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean it's almost hard to imagine that many
Speaker 1: people needing surgeries like that all at once. It's really
Speaker 1: it's really staggering when you think about it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, it really is. Actually, there was such a
Speaker 2: demand for these services that patients often had to queue
Speaker 2: up outside the hospital. So even with a thousand beds there,
Speaker 2: it just gives you a sense of how many people
Speaker 2: were affected by this. And there was this set of
Speaker 2: blue benches reserved exclusively for patients with facial disfigurements, and
Speaker 2: apparently the bright blue color was a way to warn
Speaker 2: the locals that they might want to look away when
Speaker 2: walking past the benches, and so it's just tragic to
Speaker 2: think about that, and you know, it might seem insensitive
Speaker 2: at first, but it was really as much for the
Speaker 2: patients as it was for the public, and you know,
Speaker 2: if anything, the soldiers probably appreciated the break from people
Speaker 2: staring at them all the time, I guess.
Speaker 1: So what kind of breakthroughs was Gilly's making at that time.
Speaker 2: Well, there's actually probably too many to go through here,
Speaker 2: but one of the biggest was what he called the
Speaker 2: tube pedicle or flat procedure, I guess. So basically, Gillies
Speaker 2: would cut a strip of living skin and tissue and
Speaker 2: then he would form it to this tube that was
Speaker 2: still connected to the patient at one end. Then the
Speaker 2: tube could be laid across the patient's wounded face until
Speaker 2: the skin graft actually took root.
Speaker 1: Which sounds pretty gruesome, but I'm guessing there was some
Speaker 1: sort of upside to this approach.
Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely, I mean a really big one. So before
Speaker 2: Gillies came along, reconstructive surgeries had long struggled on how
Speaker 2: to ward off infection in this open wound while they
Speaker 2: were waiting for this skin graph to take So his
Speaker 2: variation solved this problem because it ensured that blood continued
Speaker 2: to flow through the grafted area, so then once the
Speaker 2: graft had taken root, the surgeon could simply sever the
Speaker 2: tube and sculpt the remaining tissue into the patient's new
Speaker 2: nose and throat, and you know, it doesn't paint this
Speaker 2: pretty picture, but the technique was so successful that the
Speaker 2: work at Queen's Hospital continued long after the war had ended.
Speaker 2: So in total, the hospital performed more than eleven thousand
Speaker 2: operations on over five thousand patients before they finally closed
Speaker 2: their doors in nineteen twenty five. And Gillies actually received
Speaker 2: knighthood for his efforts. And when World War two began,
Speaker 2: he kept working on this new set of soldiers that
Speaker 2: were in the same kind of need.
Speaker 1: That's a tremendous legacy. But you know, we've mostly dealt
Speaker 1: with the reconstructive side of plastic surgery so far. So
Speaker 1: what do you say we switched gears and focus on
Speaker 1: the cosmetic side for a little bit.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that definitely makes sense. Actually, I'll start us off
Speaker 2: with something that I was surprised to learn this week. So,
Speaker 2: even with nearly two million cosmetic surgeries performed in the
Speaker 2: US each year, the plastic surgery industry overall has actually
Speaker 2: shrunk by about twelve percent since the year two thousand.
Speaker 1: That's strange. I wouldn't have guessed that. I mean, I
Speaker 1: guess breast augmentations and liposection. Just I mean, maybe they're
Speaker 1: not as appealing as they used to be, is that right?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean that those are still the top two
Speaker 2: cosmetic surgeries in the States, with roughly three hundred thousand
Speaker 2: each per year, But on the whole, there are fewer
Speaker 2: people undergoing the ninth than there were about, you know,
Speaker 2: twenty years or so ago. But the most interesting part
Speaker 2: to me, at least, was that while cosmetic surgeries are down,
Speaker 2: the number of minimally invasive cosmetic procedures like injection or
Speaker 2: laser hair removal, those numbers are only going up each year.
Speaker 2: So in fact, the American Society of Plastic Surgeons reports
Speaker 2: that the number of these procedures has grown nearly two
Speaker 2: hundred percent since two thousand, So that's the same period
Speaker 2: that you know, these cosmetic surgeries have been declining.
Speaker 1: Sure, and I'm sure poker tox is one of the
Speaker 1: biggest reasons for all of exactly. Yeah, you know, I
Speaker 1: do wonder what's behind that downward shift, Like, is it
Speaker 1: just that the minimally invasive stuff requires less downtime than
Speaker 1: the flow on surgeries or what's going on here?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I think that's part of it, you know,
Speaker 2: plus the fact that these procedures are cheaper, they're faster,
Speaker 2: of course, you know, less invasive, like you mentioned. And
Speaker 2: I think it also doesn't hurt that there isn't as
Speaker 2: much stigma around something like microdermabrasion as there might be
Speaker 2: in getting a tummy tuck or a nose job or
Speaker 2: something like that.
Speaker 1: So I guess it kind of comes back to the
Speaker 1: idea that plastic surgery might still carry a connotation of phoniness,
Speaker 1: like and I guess these similar types of procedures are
Speaker 1: kind of a way of sidestepping that stigma while still
Speaker 1: altering your appearance.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you know, actually, just in looking this up,
Speaker 2: I think that desire for a more natural look is
Speaker 2: something that came up a lot. And there's a really
Speaker 2: good article about this and Allure this past month, which
Speaker 2: is a sentence I never really thought i'd be saying,
Speaker 2: but I did want to share a quote from it
Speaker 2: really quickly. The author is Caitlin Clark, and here's what
Speaker 2: she writes. Disproportionate breast enhancement, overfilled lips, and exaggerated cosmetic
Speaker 2: procedures in general are all trends on their way out. Now,
Speaker 2: a successful plastic surgery or cosmetic procedure should no longer
Speaker 2: be obvious. Patients are increasingly wanting to maintain their general
Speaker 2: facial structure, inherited family traits, and just generally wanting to
Speaker 2: look like themselves, but with a few refined tweaks.
Speaker 1: Which definitely tracks with these so called tweak mins I
Speaker 1: read about last week. So there's this new skin tightening
Speaker 1: treatment that's supposed to take off this year, face tight,
Speaker 1: and it actually uses this radio frequency energy to tighten
Speaker 1: and sculpt the skin around your neck and jalline. It's
Speaker 1: totally non surgical, and the effects supposedly last up to
Speaker 1: five years, which is kind of amazing. And even on
Speaker 1: the surgical side, it seems like smaller, less obvious treatments
Speaker 1: are how most people want to go these days. For instance,
Speaker 1: there's this one procedure that's becoming really popular right now,
Speaker 1: and it addresses something so obscure that you probably forgot
Speaker 1: it's even a body part.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna guess that we're talking about the uvula here
Speaker 2: at the back of your throat, because I've actually heard
Speaker 2: they can go in and sort of like shave it
Speaker 2: down if it's bothering you. Did you know this?
Speaker 1: I didn't realize that, but I guess it's good to know.
Speaker 1: But you know, the surgery I'm talking about is actually
Speaker 1: for the filterum, which is that little indented space between
Speaker 1: your nose and your lip, and it's sometimes also called
Speaker 1: Cupid's bow too.
Speaker 2: All right, So what exactly are people doing to their filterums?
Speaker 1: Apparently the filterum elongates over time, so a lot one
Speaker 1: is a pretty clear sign of age for some people.
Speaker 1: But now there's this quick little surgery where you make
Speaker 1: a tiny incision it goes right under the nose, and
Speaker 1: then lift up the lip a little so the filter
Speaker 1: looks smaller. And while that might still sound like a
Speaker 1: lot of trouble over something so small and so unnoticeable,
Speaker 1: the procedure tends to be easier and safer than getting
Speaker 1: lip injections or I guess using a bunch of weird
Speaker 1: fillers to plump up your lips.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I can imagine how this new method
Speaker 2: might provide a more natural looking result. And from everything
Speaker 2: I've been reading this week, it does seem like the
Speaker 2: average cosmetic surgery patient is more interested in this direction nowadays,
Speaker 2: Like not this complete overhaul, but kind of a subtle
Speaker 2: I kept seeing the word plussing of what's already there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's an interesting shift from the way we used
Speaker 1: to be with these like over the top changes that
Speaker 1: gave cosmetic surgery such a bad rap in the first place.
Speaker 1: But you know, there's still a lot of potential pitfalls
Speaker 1: with these procedures, not to mention the lingering question of
Speaker 1: whether all this focus on physical appearance and beauty is
Speaker 1: actually good for us.
Speaker 2: We can spend a little bit of time mulling that
Speaker 2: one over. But before we get to that, let's take
Speaker 2: one more quick break, all right, Mago. So before the break,
Speaker 2: you were saying there are still some drawbacks to cosmetic surgery,
Speaker 2: even with all the advancements and the greater focus on
Speaker 2: a more natural look that we see these days. So
Speaker 2: do you have an example of what kind of stuff
Speaker 2: you're actually referring to?
Speaker 1: Yeah, So, why don't we go back to nose jobs
Speaker 1: for a second. We live in such an age of
Speaker 1: wonder is that it's now possible to actually reshape your
Speaker 1: nose without the need for any surgery at all. Instead,
Speaker 1: there are these non surgical nose jobs that I guess
Speaker 1: you inject this acid based filler into your nose, and
Speaker 1: the filler then lodges into the imperfections in a person's nose,
Speaker 1: kind of filling in the gaps and smoothing everything into
Speaker 1: this more dreamline shape.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's interesting because it kind of goes back
Speaker 2: to some of the reconstructive nose jobs we talked about
Speaker 2: earlier in the episode, you know, where you're actually trying
Speaker 2: to build up the nose rather than shave it down
Speaker 2: like we're used to seeing. But in this case, like,
Speaker 2: what's the concern? Is the filler unsafe? No, it's not that.
Speaker 1: And if I were going to sum up the worry,
Speaker 1: I think I'd say that the procedure makes it too
Speaker 1: easy to change the shape of your nose, and the
Speaker 1: whole thing takes something like fifteen minutes of results are
Speaker 1: visible right away. But you know what, while that sounds
Speaker 1: like it might be a win across the board, there's
Speaker 1: evidence that the ease of access is actually resulting in
Speaker 1: way more people getting nose jobs than they would otherwise.
Speaker 1: But what's concerning is that people are changing the shape
Speaker 1: of their nose or other parts of their bodies based
Speaker 1: on false evidence. And I'm actually going to tell you
Speaker 1: what this is. According to a recent report from the
Speaker 1: American Academy of Facial Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, about fifty
Speaker 1: five percent of the people who visit a plastic surgeon
Speaker 1: do so because they want to improve the their selfies.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a little disconcerting. But I mean, on the
Speaker 2: other hand, is wanting to look better in selfies that
Speaker 2: much different than wanting to look good in a bathing
Speaker 2: suit or in a wedding photo, or you know, like
Speaker 2: whatever other goal people might have.
Speaker 1: No, I mean, it isn't. But the red flag in
Speaker 1: this case is that selfies aren't actually an accurate representation
Speaker 1: of the person who took them. In fact, there was
Speaker 1: this study just last year that found that selfies taken
Speaker 1: too close can make your nose appear about thirty percent
Speaker 1: larger than it really is. And that makes sense, right, Like,
Speaker 1: if your nose sticks out of your face, it means
Speaker 1: it's close to the camera and as a result, it's
Speaker 1: much bigger compared to everything else.
Speaker 2: I mean, that makes sense. But what about the plastic
Speaker 2: surgeons themselves, Like, wouldn't they know that selfies aren't a
Speaker 2: fair representation of their clients? That did they just go
Speaker 2: ahead with the procedures anyway.
Speaker 1: I mean, at the end of the day, it's not
Speaker 1: really their call to make right. But some plastic surgeons
Speaker 1: do try to talk their patients out of it whenever possible.
Speaker 1: So you know, the study I mentioned was champion by
Speaker 1: this facial plastic surgeon named Boris Pashkov. And you notice
Speaker 1: how frequently his patients were showing him selfies to explain
Speaker 1: why they wanted the surgery. So he started taking photos
Speaker 1: of them from the proper portrait distance, which is actually
Speaker 1: five feet away, just to give him a better sense
Speaker 1: of what their face actually looks like. And as Bors
Speaker 1: put it, quote, I want them to realize that when
Speaker 1: they take a selfie, they're in essence looking into a
Speaker 1: portable funhouse mirror.
Speaker 2: You know, I do think the elephant in the room
Speaker 2: that we really haven't touched on is that with any
Speaker 2: of the drawbacks we've been talking about, it's women who
Speaker 2: are disproportionately affected by them, because when you look at
Speaker 2: the stats for plastic surgery, eighty five to ninety percent
Speaker 2: of the patients are women, depending on you know, the
Speaker 2: specific procedure, right.
Speaker 1: And the thing is people probably aren't too surprised to
Speaker 1: hear that, Like you always hear about how there's you know,
Speaker 1: an enormous pressure on women to look like other women
Speaker 1: do in movies or magazines or Instagram. And since those
Speaker 1: images are all overproduced and filtered and deaf they photoshopped,
Speaker 1: a lot of us end up devoting a lot of
Speaker 1: time and energy chasing something unattainable.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're right, it's a legitimate source of pain. And
Speaker 2: in fact, I was reading about this study in Scientific
Speaker 2: American where the researchers found that women who believe they
Speaker 2: can become more beautiful with effort have a higher risk
Speaker 2: of developing appearance based anxiety, and so they're more likely
Speaker 2: to show an interest in cosmetic surgery as a result
Speaker 2: of this.
Speaker 1: And so that wasn't the case for women who have
Speaker 1: more fixed views on their beauty.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, that's right, and you know, as you might expect,
Speaker 2: it wasn't the case for men either. But what I
Speaker 2: did find interesting about this is is that believing we
Speaker 2: can improve a trait really can help us achieve that goal. So,
Speaker 2: just to take an example here, people who think that
Speaker 2: intelligence or creativity are malleable, they tend to improve in
Speaker 2: those areas. Over time compared to people who don't believe
Speaker 2: those traits can be changed.
Speaker 1: That's weird. So having an eye towards improvement is actually
Speaker 1: a good thing for the most part.
Speaker 2: I mean, that seems to be the case, But it
Speaker 2: mostly comes down to how realistic your goal is. So
Speaker 2: according to the co author of the study, your name
Speaker 2: is Professor Melissa Berkeley, here's what she says. She says,
Speaker 2: prior research has shown that malleable beliefs increase motivation, which
Speaker 2: is good if we're talking about being motivated to stay
Speaker 2: in school or improve somebody's math skills. But when the
Speaker 2: domain is as unrealistic as the beauty standards we have
Speaker 2: for women today, increasing motivation may lead to harmful behaviors.
Speaker 1: So basically, if someone's going to alter their appearance, you know,
Speaker 1: through a procedure or surgery, they should make sure they're
Speaker 1: doing it for the right reasons, not not because of
Speaker 1: how a selfie turned out or because of the way
Speaker 1: a celebrity looks on screen, but because they want the
Speaker 1: outside to better reflect how they feel inside.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you know, cosmetic surgery can be empowering in
Speaker 2: the same way as reconstructive surgery. I mean, you know,
Speaker 2: namely as a way to reclaim or reassert your own identity.
Speaker 2: And that doesn't mean that who you are should be
Speaker 2: completely wrapped up and how you look, but being comfortable
Speaker 2: in your own skin. It's you know, it's important, and
Speaker 2: it's crucial for mental health too. And if you'd rather
Speaker 2: just dabble in a lower key approach, you can always
Speaker 2: try facer size. I mean, if it works for Tristan,
Speaker 2: it can work for anybody.
Speaker 1: I mean, he looks younger every single minute, like he's
Speaker 1: Benjamin Buttoning right in front of our eyes.
Speaker 2: All right, well, that's probably enough unsolicited beauty talk for
Speaker 2: one day, but we still have plenty left to chat
Speaker 2: about in today's fact off, so let's get to it.
Speaker 1: According to Colors magazine, Iran is the nose job capital
Speaker 1: of the world, and apparently the procedure is expensive enough
Speaker 1: that it carries a bit of a status cloud with it,
Speaker 1: So Colors puts it this way. People will wear their
Speaker 1: post surgery bandages for months like a badge of honor.
Speaker 1: Some even wear the bandages without undergoing the surgery.
Speaker 2: All right, well, they are all sorts of people who
Speaker 2: are obsessed with celebrities and get plastic surgery to look
Speaker 2: like them. You see stories of them all over the Internet,
Speaker 2: of course, and you know people paying to look more
Speaker 2: like Justin Bieber or Kylie Jenner or Lindsay Lohan. But
Speaker 2: you know, one of the most surprising cases is this
Speaker 2: Chinese writer and superfan who has spent almost a quarter
Speaker 2: of a million dollars to get ten surgeries to look
Speaker 2: like guess who William Shakespeare. And apparently the only place
Speaker 2: he refuses to spend is the haircut. For some reason,
Speaker 2: he doesn't want the Bard's receding hairline, but he's been
Speaker 2: willing to grow his hair out just to kind of
Speaker 2: amplify the look.
Speaker 1: That's great, you know. Weirdly enough, there's a surgery to
Speaker 1: switch your left and right fingerprints by slicing them off
Speaker 1: and grafting them on the other And I guess authorities
Speaker 1: only found out about this in two thousand and nine
Speaker 1: when this woman who'd been kicked out of Japan for
Speaker 1: overstaying her visa re entered the country and then was
Speaker 1: caught for a different crime. Her name was Lynn Wrong.
Speaker 1: She paid fifteen thousand dollars for the surgery to mask
Speaker 1: her fingerprints, and it's been dubbed Japan's first biometric fraud crime.
Speaker 2: All right, well, did you know the inventor of botox,
Speaker 2: who was this ophthalmologist named Alan Scott, never really cared
Speaker 2: about wrinkles. So he had this patient who'd undergone three
Speaker 2: surgeries for double vision, and this was his way of
Speaker 2: using almost like this natural duct tape to patch up
Speaker 2: the eye. So Scott says he isn't sure who was
Speaker 2: more nervous about the experimental treatment, him giving it or
Speaker 2: the patient receiving it. But once it was successful, Scott
Speaker 2: sold the concept to allergant, who immediately realized the skin's
Speaker 2: smoothing benefits.
Speaker 1: So here's something I hadn't realized. Animal plastic surgeries are
Speaker 1: actually a thing, and people have been getting Tommy tucks,
Speaker 1: eyelid lifts, and laser nostril procedures for their dogs for
Speaker 1: a while now. And the treatments aren't purely cosmetic. The
Speaker 1: treatments actually prevent bacterial infections and help the dogs with
Speaker 1: wrinkled noses breathe better. It tends to be a booming industry. Apparently,
Speaker 1: in twenty eleven, people spent sixty two million dollars on
Speaker 1: plastic surgery for their pets. But I'm actually gonna tell
Speaker 1: you about one story where it made a huge difference,
Speaker 1: and this was at the Vancouver Aquarium. There was this
Speaker 1: one eyed yellow tail rockfish and the vets there noticed
Speaker 1: it was getting bullied by the other fish in the tank,
Speaker 1: like they'd steal its food, they'd attack it from that side.
Speaker 1: And it was just low confidence, I guess. But the
Speaker 1: doctor sewed this big, bright yellow prosthetic eye into the
Speaker 1: socket and now the fish is fatter, he's doing well,
Speaker 1: and he isn't getting bullied anymore.
Speaker 2: Oh, that's a great story. Actually, I think that's good enough.
Speaker 2: I think I'm gonna let you take the fact off today. Mango.
Speaker 1: Well, I'm happy about it. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Well, that is it for today's show. If you've got
Speaker 2: facts for topics you want to share, you know, we
Speaker 2: always love hearing from you at Part Time Genius and
Speaker 2: HowStuffWorks dot com or find us on Facebook or Twitter
Speaker 2: for from Gabe, Tristan, Mango and me. Thanks so much
Speaker 2: for listening.
Speaker 1: The struct to the bottle, but the sacri