Dr. Kevin Ho
Cosmetic and Reconstructive Surgeon
Making a decision about surgery is a once in a lifetime decision and it needs to be made correctly. And delving upon plastic surgery I believe that we need to do three things. One is to check the credentials of your surgeon. The second thing is to speak to as many friends, people that you many know in the medical industry who can give you an opinion about who you might be seeking and thirdly, to obviously have a consultation and feel that you engage with that surgeon that they hear you and that you’re going to be looked after from beginning to end and as long as it takes. With that being said, the first thing is to check the credentials and there are various ways that you can do this. I believe that for an Australian plastic surgeon you need to have three minimum criterion. First is obvious you need to go on the governing body of Australia’s website APHRA, to ensure that your surgeon is a specialist qualified surgeon. Often people use the term surgeon and are not specialist trained and you need to check that they’ve been trained in surgery and are not just using the title surgeon. The second thing is to ensure that they have the letters FRACS. Now that’s very important. There are colleges that that have letters very similar but FRACS stands for Fellow of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons. And you can look up on the website of FRACS who the surgeons that belong to that are. To know that your surgeon has gone through all the necessary hurdles of years of training, the various terms that they must do, the examinations they must pass as well as continuing their medical education. And lastly the third thing to be a recognised plastic surgeon in Australia is that they are member of the Australian Society of Plastic Surgeons. I think that once you tick those three criterion, you have a very good idea that the credentials have been met. The second aspect of finding the right surgeon for you obviously involves speaking to friends and families, people who are in the medical profession, anyone you know that may have been through the same procedure or looking on online forms. Once you have narrowed down your choices, you should obviously go and meet the surgeon that you are thinking about and I always recommend that you should see two or three. Once you find the one that you connect with, that you feel has heard you, then you can proceed. There is never any obligation and you should never feel that. If you feel induced or coerced then you are probably not in the right place. I personally recommend that my patients see however many times and as many people as they need to so that they feel that they’ve made the right choice. I deliberately do not charge for second, third fourth, fifth or sixth preoperative consultations because I feel that you as a patient need to meet me as many times as you feel until you are comfortable and in the end of that I more than happy for you to still choose someone else. The only time that I step in is if I truly feel that you may be going to someone who is not as well trained or may not have your interests at heart and then I will obviously step in but that does not involve me stepping in to coerce you to be my patient. I’m more than happy to recommend other names that I feel can treat you well. With all of that in mind and all that information, you can find an abridged summary of that on my website DrHo.com.au and I hope that this afford you a bit of information so that you can make an informed choice and make the right decision for your surgery.