Chennai: Plastic surgery has certainly advanced from being a cosmetic surgery to reconstructive surgery, but the lack of awareness among people and high costs make them unaffordable and in-accessible for them. While new technologies and methodologies remain a highlight in plastic and reconstructive surgery field, it exists only for the privileged.
“Various types of surgeries can be carried out to enhance the appearance of an individual under reconstructive and aesthetic surgeries. The confidence level can be improved if a deformity leads to any inferiority in the person, especially inborn deformities in the body,” says Dr Selva Seetharaman, senior consultant at the Institute of Plastic, Aesthetic and reconstructive surgery, Gleneagles Global Hospital.
Though doctors say that enhancement of physical appearances by plastic sur-gery can aid with improved mental health giving them confidence about their looks, pockets of the common people are not enough deep to bear the cost of such surgeries.
“People have the idea of plastic surgery for enhancing the physical appearance, which might not be very cost-friendly. But Government hospitals and some private hospitals in the city provide free reconstructive surgeries to the patients for the correction of deformities. People are not aware of those schemes,” says Dr P. Vasanthamani, dean, Kilpauk Medical College. Lack of awareness amou-nts to lack of treatment of deformities such as palate deformities, acid attacks marks, and others. Since the reconstrutive surgeries offered for free at hospitals, information gap between the government schemes and the people about the availability of affordable facilities is the biggest drawback.
“The necessary surgeries for removing deformities can be performed free of cost under the Chief Minister’s Comprehensive Health insurance Scheme for people below the poverty line. But people remain unaware of such schemes available at the government hospitals,” says Dr Narayanan Babu, dean, Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital.
