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PLASTIC SURGERY NEWS, SURGERY NEWS, COSMETIC SURGERY NEWS Current NEWS  |
Careful search can lead to surgery success
Lisa Marie Gómez
San Antonio Express-News
McALLEN — After bearing two children, Univision broadcaster Miriam Martinez began to worry at the age of 27 how she looked on camera.
Blond, good-looking and still petite, Martinez wanted plastic surgery to correct what she perceived as flaws.
"My breasts had fallen from all the breast-feeding," said Martinez, who decided to shop around for a breast lift.
After an extensive search, she decided that doctors on this side of the border were beyond her means. And after talking to women who had their surgery in the Rio Grande Valley, she wasn't convinced their results were worth the price.
Relying on word of mouth, she paid a visit to plastic surgeon Dr. Raúl López Castillo in Reynosa, whom she had met through her social circle.
She posed the same questions recommended by Mexican health officials: What was his background? Was he certified? Was his clinic accredited?
And she would want to meet some of his patients.
She would find that his posh office is one of the few on the border to be accredited. López showed her his college diploma and certifications from the Mexican Association of Plastic, Aesthetic and Reconstructive Surgery, and the prestigious International Society of Aesthetic Plastic Surgery.
In addition to having the right credentials, and the right price, his clinic is not like other hospitals in Mexico.
"It looks like something you'd see in Hollywood or Beverly Hills," Martinez said.
The clinic has central air-conditioning, marble floors, granite countertops and recessed lighting. Soothing classical music plays throughout the building.
But what really sold her were his results.
"Even doctors' wives on this side of the border go to him," she said. "And everyone I met who had gone to him (López) looked really, really good."
Her experience indicates patients can find qualified surgeons and accredited clinics in Mexico's border cities. Experts say patients must do their homework and should not settle for cheap surgery at an unregistered clinic.
Like Martinez, Queta Quiroga of Brownsville sought out a certified surgeon in Matamoros for a facelift, tummy tuck and breast augmentation.
She consulted with two doctors before settling with Dr. José Orozco Corral.
"The other doctor was cold, too fast, like he wanted me out of the office in a hurry because he had other patients," she said. "Orozco was warm and friendly and he let me ask him lots of questions and didn't rush me."
Orozco, who carries Mexican and international certifications, is among the wave of doctors from interior cities who travel to satellite clinics on the border. Based in Guadalajara, he performed about 50 surgeries in Matamoros in 1999. Last year he performed 10 times as many.
"I tried it in 1999 and found that there was a need for good plastic surgeons along the border," he said from his office in Matamoros.
Orozco said Mexican surgeons can charge less because their cost of living is lower.
"And, in the United States, you have to pay very high insurance rates on everything — here we don't," he said.
Quiroga, 45, ended up getting five procedures and paid about $13,700, roughly half of what she would have spent in the United States.
An unaccredited Mexican clinic would have charged even less.
Martinez and Quiroga both promote Mexican surgery to their friends. Martinez took that a step further and decided to endorse Dr. López on TV.
"I wouldn't do that if I didn't believe he was truly the best," said Martinez, who also endorses a few other companies.
In the 30-second commercial she talks about López and his medical credentials as a surgeon and his state-of-the-art facility.
The commercial airs on her station in Spanish, and ends with the message, "Porque puedes lucir mejor," because you can look better.
http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/medical/stories/MYSA020605.12A.border_makeover_sider.7d2b2d27.html
