Every month, we strive to bring you a balanced mix of breaking news (the Botox warning doctors are issuing across social media, for instance) and advice you can always use, like the merits of chin liposuction versus Kybella. Invariably though, there’s an intriguing headline or viral post that doesn’t make its own stand-alone story yet is still worthy of a share.
Which brings us here, to the latest installment of This Month in Aesthetics, an ICYMI recap of industry-molding moments that we’d be remiss not to acknowledge—from a supermodel’s favorite in-office treatments to a former Baywatch star’s breast augmentation regret.
Pharma giant Eli Lilly enables telehealth services for weight-loss drugs
The Ozempic bandwagon shows no signs of stopping, with even more GLP-1 agonists—the compounds that lead to weight loss—hitting the market. Eli Lilly, the pharmaceutical company that manufactures Mounjaro (which is FDA approved to treat type 2 diabetes) and Zepbound (approved for obesity), is cutting out the middleman with LillyDirect, a new service that connects potential patients to telehealth providers. This way, people interested in these medications can get access to it without having to see a doctor in person, making it even more convenient.
Blac Chyna faced complications after breast implant removal
One of the latest celebrities to rethink their breast implants, Blac Chyna opened up about the surgery to downsize her implants in an Instagram Reel—and described the unexpected complications that ensued. “One of the worst things that could happen happened,” she said. “One of my breasts got encapsulated.” Despite having several previous breast surgeries, she’d never experienced it before, and she called it “so painful.” After reducing her breast implants’ size to 385cc, she further reduced them in a second surgery to 190cc, to prevent further issues down the road.
Christie Brinkley shares the injectables and lasers she swears by
Back in June 2023, model and actress Christie Brinkley posted a selfie to Instagram—and soon updated the post with a caption responding to those who called out her wrinkles. Now, in a new interview, she’s opening up about how she felt about it and how it’s shaped her overall approach to aging. For one, she’s not a big fan of neuromodulators like Botox. “I’ve Botoxed my forehead two times,” she said. “It did look smooth as could be, but the first time, it gave me a droopy eyebrow.” Her injectables for her smile lines have been more successful—she gets filler roughly once a year—and she supplements it with Fraxel laser resurfacing twice a year, to tackle sun damage.
Kim Kardashian explains the controversial tanning bed in her office
Another month, another Kardashian controversy. Kim posted a tour of her SKKN headquarters to TikTok and showed off her tanning bed alongside her magazine covers and a 3D model of her brain. The backlash was swift, especially since her sister Khloé recently had a melanoma removed from her face, with plastic surgeon Dr. Kelly Killeen responding, “Yeah, you’re Kim Kardashian. Your sister had a melanoma,” and dermatologist Dr. Scott Walker saying, “Kim, no disrespect, but why do you have a tanning bed when your sister has had a melanoma herself?”
In a statement posted on X (formerly Twitter), Kardashian responded: “I have psoriasis and it really helps when it’s bad. But I don’t use it too often.” (For the record, the National Psoriasis Foundation says that tanning beds don’t actually help with psoriasis, since it’s the UVB rays that are therapeutic—whereas most tanning beds have only UVA rays.)
Selena Gomez is making peace with her body
After years of enduring scrutiny around her size and flat-out body shaming—much of which followed her lupus diagnosis—the Only Murders in the Building star shared her newfound body acceptance in an Instagram Story in two parts.
The first photo, from 2013, showed her at 21 years old in a bikini; “Today I realized I will never look like this again…,” she wrote in the caption. The next photo was of the singer in a bikini during a trip to Cabo San Lucas in 2023. “I’m not perfect, but I am proud to be who I am… Sometimes I forget it’s ok to be me,” she wrote in the caption.
Botched star Dr. Terry Dubrow is done using Ozempic
Some celebrities are admitting to taking Ozempic, others are denying it, and plastic surgeon and Dr. Terry Dubrow is leaving it behind. “I wanted to try it because so many of my patients were on it, and I wanted to see what it was like when you’re not diabetic and you only have 10 to 15 pounds to lose,” he said in an interview, calling the medication “a miracle.” But after losing weight and experiencing some side effects for himself, including what he called “low-grade nausea” and loss of appetite, he decided to quit. “I thought, ‘You know what, I kind of want to get my appetite back. The holidays are coming, I want to enjoy myself,’” he explained.
Boy George admits to taking Mounjaro and getting a tummy tuck
In his new memoir, out this month, singer and Culture Club frontman Boy George went into detail about the cosmetic procedures he’s had—and those he’s skipped. After losing almost 100 pounds, he got a tummy tuck, calling it “the most painful thing I’ve ever done.”
He’s also received three hair transplants and has taken both Ozempic and, more recently, Mounjaro, noting that he’s long struggled with his weight and “being under public and media scrutiny doesn’t help,” he wrote. As for what’s off the table? Injectables. “I’ve never had Botox, though, and I might be the only person in show business with my own face,” he wrote.
Former Baywatch star opens up about breast augmentation regrets
Actress Nicole Eggert was just 18 when she first started filming the hit TV series Baywatch—and got a breast augmentation. “When you have to put on that one-piece and it’s like you’re so flat that it’s, like, pleating—you got pleats across the front. You’re like, ‘What is this?,’” she said while recounting her decision to get the surgery, which she did during a break in filming. “[There’s] nothing you can do. You can’t stuff it with anything. You can’t do anything.”
In 2015, she got a breast reduction from Dr. Terry Dubrow, which was chronicled on Botched. “It was a stupid 18-year-old decision,” she says.
Joan Rivers would have loved Ozempic, says daughter Melissa
Although comedian Joan Rivers passed away in 2014—years before Ozempic hit the shelves—her daughter, actress and TV host Melissa Rivers, thinks that she would have loved the weight-loss medication. “She would have thought Ozempic was the greatest thing since sliced bread. Her two least favorite things were diet and exercise, so if she could find a way to avoid both? Awesome,” Rivers said. (That said, she also noted that her mother would have been thrilled with the concept of body acceptance. “That would have actually made her really happy,” she says.)
The CDC announces that 93 Americans have died from cosmetic surgeries in the Dominican Republic
A new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention details the procedures in the Dominican Republic—a popular medical tourism destination due to its proximity to the U.S., shorter wait times, and lower costs—that have led to the deaths of 93 Americans over the past 14 years, with a peak of 17 people dying in 2020.
All the fatal cases occurred after liposuction, while Brazilian butt lifts, abdominoplasties, and breast augmentation were also popular procedures. For the deaths that were confirmed with an autopsy, they were attributed to complications both during and after surgery, such as fat embolism (in which fat causes a clog in the bloodstream) and pulmonary venous thromboembolism (a blood clot). “Fat embolism is a recognized risk associated with fat injections, particularly as used in gluteal augmentation,” the CDC stated in the report.
50 Cent denies using Ozempic to lose 40 pounds
In an Instagram video, rapper 50 Cent denied that he used Ozempic to lose weight, instead pointing to exercise (namely, cardio) as the reason he dropped from 253 to 210 pounds. “Everybody talking about weight loss. I was in the gym. I was working the f*** out, man. Who says Ozempic?” he said. “I was running. I was doing what I had to do.” In doing so, he joins the legions of celebrities who’ve shut down speculation around using the weight-loss medication.
