Patient Stories

Facial Rejuvenation- JL Surgical Experience

This is a 62 year old gentleman who expressed concerns about facial wrinkles, facial laxity and asymmetry, and neck deformities, which he said had bothered him for quite some time. The patient reported that he felt especially self-conscious about the appearance of his neck and wore a beard in an attempt to conceal this area.

“I have always had the good fortune of having all of my hair remain strawberry blonde. So, I created this self-impression that I was very young. When I was 50 years old, I caught myself in the mirror and I saw this unpleasant growth under my chin. Oh my goodness, I didnâ€^™t know what to do! I began to follow it on a very regular basis for a period of over ten years. Because my background was in science, like Dr. Sullivan, I have opportunities for public speaking. I began to realize, I was loosing my confidence. I began wondering, “what must this audience be thinking of a fellow who looks like this?â€.

Meeting Dr. Sullivan

“My father taught me when I was young, he said, “Son, if somebody tells you something that sounds too good to be true, it usually isâ€. But, the key word here is usually. I had met Dr. Sullivan, and I have met many medical professionals given my background, and I loved his sincerity, I loved his serious scientific approach, and I loved his frankness. He told me, ‘you present a very stiff challenge, and I may have to go back in and do somethingâ€^™ and I was very thankful for that. “One thing about Dr. Patrick Sullivan and the interviewing process, and many of you have gone through it, that was remarkably reassuring and for me, it told me that, well, it really wasnâ€^™t too good to be true.

Donâ€^™t Wait!

“I went to Dr. Sullivan in 2005, and I didnâ€^™t have the surgery until 2010. What Iâ€^™m going to tell you here, the best piece of advice I can give you is, ‘Donâ€^™t Wait!â€^™ Because, five years times 365 days is almost 1,700 days of looking in the mirror and being disappointed and saying, ‘Well at least my hair is still strawberry blonde.â€^™ Donâ€^™t hesitate! You really want to have this done and donâ€^™t worry about cost because, as all of us will tell you, you canâ€^™t put a price on self-confidence. It doesnâ€^™t lead to vanity, it just leads to a remarkable self-confidence and self-satisfaction.â€

Surgery

Dr. Sullivan was able to address all of our patient concerns by performing, endoscopic forehead and temporal rejuvenation with hairline incision, face and neck rejuvenation with subplatysmal fat removal, and fat injections to the face. The facial rejuvenation and neck surgery was performed using intravenous sedation, rather than general anesthesia. The goal was to keep the patients face and neck surgery pain free and also keep him comfortable after his surgery. This face and neck procedure involved:

1. Endoscopic brow lift with forehead rejuvenation using small incisions hidden in the scalp hair
2. A multi-layer face lift with sculpting and removal of fatty deposits in the face and neck.
3. Fat grafting using the patientâ€^™s own fat to fill in deflated areas around the face
4. Deep-plane neck contouring to remove fat in the neck and smooth out the significant deformities in this area.

Recovery

“I had this done 18 months ago on the 2nd of December. As you know, in December you are worried about your children coming home and relatives gathering and you have these fears that youâ€^™ll be all cut up and just an unpresentable mess. I was told in two weeks I could begin to resume my life and I did that. Three weeks later at Christmas, I had to convince people that three weeks earlier I had been in surgery for 7.5 hours. It is just the most exciting and thrilling experience. I tell you, I donâ€^™t regret giving [public] talks anymore. Worth it? There comes a time when you face this moment, are you going to resign to gravity or are you going to continue to fight it? When you begin to appear youthful, you get sensitive to other aspects of your appearance that might detract from that youthfulness: if you carry a little too much weight, or if youâ€^™re really not that healthy. So this has really just intensified my physical exercise program. Iâ€^™ve always been an avid bicycle rider. In many ways I regard Dr. Sullivanâ€^™s craft and mastery, in my case, as just the first step to a new lifetime of being physically fit as well as presenting a youthful appearance”

Videos