Question: How is the fee for laser hair removal determined?  By the time required for the procedure or the area treated? Does the time take the same in an area whether there is abundant hair present or not?

Answer:  Laser hair removal fees are usually determined by the surface area that is required for treatment and this obviously then is also directly proportional to the amount of time that is required to treat the area.  Whether or not there is abundant hair present in that area is rather irrelevant since we are going to have to treat the entire area whether or not there are several hairs or thousands of hairs.  There certainly are patients that just require spot treatments for small areas with a small amount of hair, but we would obviously charge less if we were only treating a small area.

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Question: Does the degree of swelling after rhinoplasty have more to do with what was done during surgery or with the patient?

Answer: The degree of swelling from a rhinoplasty can certainly be due to the surgeon’s technique in that surgeons that are more refined in their technique and do not damage the surrounding tissue can often end up with less swelling than surgeons that are less experienced or are not as technically gifted.  I do, however, feel that patients with multiple cartilage grafts also tend to have more swelling due to the fact that more trauma is experienced and the fact that the cartilage graft itself may allow for more inflammatory change to occur during the healing process and then the patients themselves certainly can also have an impact on the amount of swelling since obviously some patients will swell more from a traumatic injury than others, so I really feel it is most likely a combination of a variety of factors that will determine how much swelling a rhinoplasty patient gets and how quickly the swelling will subside in those patients.

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Question: I’ve heard of Kenalog injections for improving swelling after rhinoplasty. What are these? Are they safe and do they really work?

Answer:Kenalog allows the swelling to subside and, therefore, avoids this fibrosis and the unexpected outcome.  Overall, Kenalog injections, at least the dilute 10 mg per mL suspension, are extremely safe when performed in experienced hands.

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Question: If I have my otoplasty surgery done in the winter, is it okay to wear hats that cover the ears during recovery?

Answer: It is perfectly fine to wear hats that cover the ears as long as they are not putting a significant amount of pressure on the ears during the recovery period.  In fact, it would be wise to protect the ears due to the fact that they would be slightly more at risk of frostbite after the otoplasty, and we certainly would not want to traumatize the ears accidentally during the recovery phase.  The hat would, therefore, not only protect it from the cold but also from any sort of trauma.

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Question: One of my ears has always been slightly misshapen. What is the usual recovery time for an otoplasty?

Answer: Recovery from an otoplasty typically is only a few days in length.  I personally just place a pressure dressing overnight that can be removed the next day and though the ears may have a slight amount of swelling and bruising and tenderness, patients are usually back doing relatively normal nonstrenuous activities in the first couple of days.

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