Are Face Transplants a Solution or a Bigger Problem?/Breast Implants Linked with Suicide

[Guest guest]

Are Face Transplants a Solution or a Bigger Problem?

http://www.unknowncountry.com/news/?id=5058

 

 

 

 

 

The newest kind of plastic surgery is the face transplant. This is not done for the reason ordinary plastic surgery is usually done, because someone isn't happy with the way they look. People who get face transplants have been extremely disfigured, usually from car accidents or fires. For them, this is a life saver, even if it means they end up looking like someone else.

Plastic surgeon Raj Persaud is studying how having a new face is affecting these people psychologically. Psychologists are concerned that literally wearing another person's face may cause identity problems in an individual, even if, as is almost always the case, the recipient of the face did not know the donor. Psychologist Didier Anzieu believes that our face is strongly tied to what Freud called our ego, or sense of self. After they wake up from the anesthesia, will these people still know who they are? He says that people undergoing face transplants are actually doing this for others, not for themselves, and that such a large sacrifice, that causes so much pain and confusion, is not necessarily a good idea. It can't be equated with having a life-saving transplant of someone else's heart, liver or kidney. Bioethicists Richard Huxtable and Julie Woodley object to the fact that the media is portraying face transplant patients as being brave, when they may just be people who have bought our society's emphasis on outer—rather than inner—beauty. Plastic surgeon Guy Foucher, president of the International Federation of Hand Surgeons, now opposes hand transplants because he says that they "transform a healthy, one-handed man into a sick man with two hands." In 1998, New Zealand's Clint Hallam became the first person in the world to receive a hand transplant. Two years later, he stopped taking his anti- rejection drugs because he said he didn't feel like himself anymore, and the hand was removed. It's the same reason that some deaf people object to giving up sign language, which they consider part of their culture, for attempts to try to speak with their voices, the way hearing people do.

 

Breast Implants Linked with Suicide

http://www.unknowncountry.com/news/?id=2475

 

 

 

 

 

Women who get breast implants are three times more likely to commit suicide, according to a Dutch study. They think the desire for bigger breasts may be a symptom of deep insecurity and lack of self-esteem. Dr. Veronica Koot says, "We think that some of the women who ask for cosmetic surgery—for instance breast implants—actually do have another problem, and if you operate, it won't help them. These women should first seek help for their psychological problems before seeking cosmetic surgery. There should be some kind of training for [surgeons]—they are not experienced psychologists."

The researchers studied 3,521 Swedish women ages 15 to 69 who had breast implants between 1965 and 1993. When the causes of deaths in the group were analyzed, they found that there were 15 suicides in the breast implant group compared with five in the control group. There are many kinds of beauty—we don't have to change ourselves, only learn to like ourselves. There are many kinds of