[Eton TV] Plastic Surgery! If You're 고민ing Over Choosing a Doctor?

Experienced doctor vs. young, energetic doctor

Who should you choose?

It’s a somewhat sensitive and risky topic,

but since it’s an important question,

I’ll take some time to honestly talk about

what experience means for a doctor.

A doctor’s profession is basically

trained through an "apprenticeship" system.

Just studying in medical school doesn’t mean

you can immediately work as a practicing doctor.

I think the goal of medical education is to get you to a level where

you can understand what other doctors are saying.

In other words, you spend six difficult and exhausting years

studying hard to accurately understand the meaning of medical terms

and figure out how the medical system works.

You can’t just read books and then put a scalpel to a patient’s body.

That’s why you go through "apprenticeship training."

Put simply,

it’s a system where senior doctors

teach and guide junior doctors directly, side by side.

When I was an intern,

if a senior doctor in the operating room said, "Hey, tape!"

my job was to take tape out of my pocket and hand it over.

After that, I would spread the tape open,

a senior resident one or two years above me would cut it,

and another senior doctor would apply it.

It took four years before I was directly applying tape during nose surgery myself.

Going through this kind of apprenticeship training

makes it true, of course, that the person with more experience can do better.

As the saying goes, "The one who has done more surgeries is the best" 😅

It’s true that the more you do something, the better you get little by little.

So, the strengths of more experienced doctors are clearly

"refined technique" and "experience with a wide variety of cases."

Now, shall we talk about the strengths of younger doctors?

How can they overcome their lack of experience?

First of all, obtaining a "specialist" qualification means

that you spent five years training without even going home,

pouring your entire life into it.

In other words, they already have the basic skills to do anything.

And when I was younger,

I did surgery "cheaply." 😂

If the price is low, does that mean the quality of the surgery is also lower?

Absolutely not!

They’ve been trained, after all.

When I first started cosmetic surgery,

I spent a month preparing for a single double-eyelid surgery.

I went through papers, called senior doctors, and even visited senior doctors’ hospitals to observe.

I also watched the surgeries that professors performed

and assisted a lot,

but directly performing the surgery myself was different.

I prepared as thoroughly as possible

to make sure nothing would go wrong for the patient.

This can be a strength of younger doctors.

And there’s also the ability to stay "up to date."

I’ve been a doctor for more than 20 years,

so I also learned surgical methods from 30 years ago.

Of course, the latest surgical method is not always the best,

but younger doctors can learn and apply recently proven techniques

more quickly.

We keep studying too,

but stepping away from familiar methods

and applying new ones is harder than you might think.

Then,

what should patients consider most importantly

when choosing a doctor?

In plastic surgery, I think

"creativity and flexibility," as well as "quick reflexes," are important.

Some doctors go in having planned everything perfectly,

but

in my case,

I tend to grasp the main framework

and adjust according to the situation as it comes.

This kind of flexible way of thinking

is only possible if your mind stays flexible, and as people age,

they go through aging and may lose some flexibility.

And physical limitations can’t be ignored either.

I don’t operate for more than 15 hours a day anymore.

Because I decide the amount of surgery based on whether I can

greet patients feeling refreshed the next morning,

the number of surgeries I do inevitably has to decrease.

In my view, a doctor’s "prime"

is personally around the time after becoming a specialist,

roughly 5 to 10 years into their career,

when they are at their hottest.

That’s the period when rough edges are largely covered,

and enough experience has been accumulated.

During this time,

they do as many surgeries as their physical stamina allows.

But I think the moment you start thinking, "I’m the best,"

you begin to stagnate.

That’s why I think it’s important to always keep moving forward and trying to do better.

The surgeries I did when I was younger

were done with my best effort at the time, and the patients were satisfied,

but looking back now,

there are parts I could have done better.

Even surgeries I did last year, when I look at them now,

I think I could have done better.

In the end, whether you have a lot of experience or not,

I think the most important thing is the willingness to keep striving and improving.

Rather than a doctor’s experience or age,

I think the most important thing is choosing a doctor who keeps working

and improving for the patient.

If you’re considering plastic surgery and struggling with the choice of doctor,

between "experience vs. young energy,"

I hope today’s post was helpful.

If you want to hear more detailed stories,

check out the YouTube channel <Eton TV>.