On October 9th this year, I went into London's Chelsea & Westminster Hospital to have my forehead remodeled with one of the world's top craniofacial surgeons - Mr Simon Eccles.
He is a charming, gentle and caring human being. All the staff at the C & W respect and love him to bits.
One week later, the bruising has almost gone which is outstanding considering the three hours of work that had to be done on my forehead.
Eleven days after surgery, Mr Eccles's nurse assistant removed over 40 staples along the coronal incision and not one hair graft follicle was disturbed. She took over 30 minutes to remove them all.
Prior to the surgery, a 3D CT Scan was carried out in November 2013 which highlighted the painful bony deformity over the left sinus cavity and a 3D model was subsequently made.
This was also required so that Cavendish Implants in London (
http://cavendishimplants.com/ ) could manufacture the two PEEK implants that Mr Eccles placed over both supraorbital margins as they did not really exist at all.
Now my eyes have much better definition.
Mr Eccles is a founder member of the charity 'Facing the World'.
http://facingtheworld.net/Also see his excellent talk here:
He used the exisiting incision which is now behind my hairline as I have had hairgrafting since the original coronal incision was made when I had my original FFS in February 2004.
If it was not for the NHS, I would have had to live with the serious problem and I am indeed fortunate to live in a country where remedial/revision surgery is available.
I have had quite a few problems with various transition related operations since I began down this road in 1988, but that's the risk one takes sadly.
In 1991, I paid for a Brow Lift to be done. The surgeon Peter Jordan said that the resultant scars would be invisible (he lied) as he performed a Direct Brow Lift and I still have visible scars above each eyebrow. In those days there was no internet to seek advice and groups/forums like this did not exist either.
Next year, I am going to have some hairgrafts put in these browlift scars to hide them and as a result will have Brooke Shields eyebrows !! which is fine. Any damage to my scalp hairgrafts can be done at the same time and I will return to Paul Cotterill in Toronto who performed three sessions, in December 2004, June 2005 & July 2006. His work is awesome. See:
http://www.drcotterill.com/Now nearly 10 weeks after surgery, everything has settled down and overall I am pleased with the result.
It does not seem that I have had much hairloss along the incision line because Mr Eccles used a bevelled type of incision which helps to prevent damage to the hair.
Mr Eccles has also put fat in the area above my eyebrows to diminish the indented scars that were left due to that awful direct brow lift.
He will top up this fat, if required.
So my advice to anyone having major surgery done in the private sector, make 100% sure that you seek written confirmation from your surgeon that any complications will be revised free of charge. And I mean any complications whether serious or relatively minor.
Frankly I don't know what I would have done without the NHS who really care for you post-operatively.
In February 2012, I had my 19 year old breast implants removed by the NHS at London's Charing Cross Hospital ( the right one was leaking) and also a breast lift was done at the same time, otherwise my breasts would have looked terrible. I still see the surgeon Miss Dex for regular check-ups and scar revision injections each 3 months and next year she is going to tattoo around the areolas to hide the orbital scars. So the aftercare has been wonderful.
I am seeing Mr Eccles again in March and I am so happy to know that I am being looked after post-operatively.
So I am very fortunate to be a UK citizen and have received wonderful care down the years for various transition and non-transition operations.
Mr Eccles performs quite a lot of revisions to other surgeons work and also performs primary FFS. He gets much of his FFS work through recommendation.
It's brilliant that we have one of the world's top craniofacial surgeons right here in the UK performing FFS.
In the not too distant future, I am going to get him to perform a neck lift on me to get rid of that " turkey neck " ...
He has quoted me a price.
I am so glad that I have found him and that's purely down to my local GP (doctor) referring me to the Chelsea & Westminster Hospital in London where Mr Eccles operates on his NHS patients.
Merry Christmas everyone and have a wonderful 2015. I hope that all your dreams come true ...
Paula 1
