Cosmetic procedure

Cosmetic surgery procedures

Cosmetic surgery is a voluntary or elective surgery that is performed on normal parts of the body with the sole purpose of improving a person's appearance or removing signs of aging. Some cosmetic surgeries such as breast reduction are also functional and can help to relieve symptoms of discomfort such as back ache or neck ache. Cosmetic surgeries are also undertaken following breast cancer and mastectomy to recreate the natural breast shape which has been lost during the process of removing the cancer. In 2014, nearly 16 million cosmetic procedures were performed in the United States alone. The number of cosmetic procedures performed in the United States has almost doubled since the start of the century. In 2014, 92% of cosmetic procedures were performed on women, up from 88% in 2001. Approximately 15.6 million cosmetic procedures were performed in 2020, with the five most common surgeries being rhinoplasties, blepharoplasties, rhytidectomies, liposuctions, and breast augmentation. Breast augmentation continues to be one of the top 5 cosmetic surgical procedures and has been since 2006. Silicone implants were used in 84% and saline implants in 16% of all breast augmentations in 2020. The American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery looked at the statistics for 34 different cosmetic procedures. Nineteen of the procedures were surgical, such as rhinoplasties or rhytidectomies. The nonsurgical procedures included botox and laser hair removal. In 2010, their survey revealed that there were 9,336,814 total procedures in the United States. Of those, 1,622,290 procedures were surgical (p. 5). They also found that a large majority, 81%, of the procedures were done on Caucasian people (p. 12).