What type of doctor should a person go to for lipo?

    I would find a board certified plastic surgeon who offers the full scope of procedures in body contouring and performs hundreds of liposuction procedures each year.  Look for great reviews and before and after pictures on that surgeon's website.Kenneth Hughes, MDLos Angeles, CA

 In the US medical community virtually every specialty has someone performing liposuction. I think you would be best served by having liposuction done by someone in a surgical specialty.

All docs do lipo but when you value quality results over cheap prices then you see a board certified derm surgeon since they invented the tumescent liposuction under local anesthesia and they tend to use the smaller cannulas for better fine tuning when they stand you up and have you turn in all positions to get the best results. Now to be fair, a board certified plastic surgeon can still do a decent job of liposuction although you will routinely see them do it under general anesthesia and use the larger cannulas which we all did 30 yrs ago.

In short, the best liposuction doctor you can find is the one who does a lot of liposuction cases.  Clearly, I am biased towards Plastic Surgeons, but to be fair I will say that there are some Dermatologists who get very good results as well.  I suggest you make sure you use a doctor who can show you many examples of patients who look much like you - and who's results you think are good.Having said that, the other answers I see here are also important.  Please make sure your doctor is board certified and has hospital privileges to perform the procedure as well.  Without those criteria, you should not ever consider having a procedure with a given physician.Good Luck!

Liposuction is a very common and popular procedure in the United States. I would recommend for you find a board certified Plastic Surgeon to perform liposuction for you. You will find in your state various types of physicians performing liposuction. In Nevada ENT, general surgeon, ER physician, family practioners, OB-Gyn doctors, cosmetic surgeons, and plastic surgeon perform liposuction. Plastic surgeons are trained during their residency in how to master the art of liposuction. There are physicians who do not have any training and only have gone to a weekend course and now are performing liposuction. Therefore, please do your research prior to selecting your doctor. 

Liposuction is one of the most popular and common procedures done in the USA. Plastic surgeons go through residency training and liposuction is part of the core curriculum in training and part of the scope of practice of plastic surgery. Since it is a popular surgical procedure, a lot of other specialties do liposuction with varying degree of success. Liposuction is done by plastic surgeons and dermatologists in the US, but a lot of other surgical or even medical specialties (no surgical training) are getting into the "game". In our community you can find ENT surgeons, oral and maxillofacial surgeons, gynecologists, general surgeons and even family practitioners and emergency room physicians! Any physician in the Stare of Washington who holds an MD license can do liposuction in their private office. To be safe, you need to ask your doctor if he/she can perform the same surgery at the hospital and not only in their clinic. Hospitals will give privileges only to physicians whose scope of practice encompasses liposuction as well (an ENT surgeon might be allowed to do liposuction of the neck, but not the rest of the body). Some practitioners do liposuction under local tumescent anesthesia only, while others use  sedation or even general anesthesia with the tumescent solution. I, personally, use local anesthesia only if I do a staged procedure and do a "debulking liposuction" before the next stage, which might involve further liposuction, fat transfer and/or a tummy tuck. The second stage is done under intravenous sedation. If I do body sculpting, which involves deep and superficial liposuction with fat grafting to the breasts or buttocks, intravenous sedation is a must. See a board certified plastic surgeon if you are interested in more than just fat reduction or if you want to achieve a more athletic body. Good luck.

In Texas and in an office setting, any physician can do any procedure and is only limited by their conscience and their patient's good sense.  Liposuction can be done in an office setting but I would be certain that your surgeon has privileges to perform your desired procedure in your local hospital. Your local hospital has committees whose job is to insure that health care providers in their facility have adequate training for the procedures that they request to perform.  Hope this helps

Any surgeon that is a member of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons is a safe choice, Some physicians that offer this procedure are inadequately trained with weekend courses only rather than a multiple year training program that is required of a Plastic Surgeon. Make yourself aware of the appropriate credentials before you make an appointment.

Although many types of doctors perform liposuction doctors certified by the American Board of Plastic Surgery are the only ones who have complete training of both the procedures and how to care for complications of this procedure. Only surgeons are allowed in the operating room at most major hospitals and therefore dermatologists are generally not even certified to do this at any hospital. Please ask the surgeon what their qualifications are. Surgeons who are members of the American Society of Aesthetic Plastic Surgery are the Plastic Surgeons who specialize in cosmetic plastic surgery and are the most highly trained in that area.

The following is a response I left a few weeks ago. It covers some basic ideas behind board certification, qualifications and who can do what procedures.This is an excellent question and a very important one.My answers tend to be lengthy at times. This may be one of those longer answers.No single physician or medical specialty has a monopoly on any one procedure or treatment. Legally, a radiologist can do heart transplants. In reality, though, that is usually not the case. Most major surgeries are done in operating rooms. To get access to an operating room in a hospital or surgery center, the physician has to have privileges. Privileges are only granted to physicians with appropriate qualifications. Unless a physician owns their own hospital or surgery center, they are required to have appropriate training and background. There are many physicians who do own their own surgery center or do substantial surgeries in their offices.Since the scope of practice cannot legally be limited, there needs to be some mechanism to protect the public. These include state medical boards and other regulatory agencies as well as board certifications.The great majority of medical board certifications are overseen by the American Board of Medical Specialties.That's an excellent place to start if you want to get some further background on board certification.All the different medical specialty boards overseen by the American Board of Medical Specialties require some type of residency or fellowship training or proof of competencies. The great majority of practicing physicians in the United States belong to one of the many boards overseen by this agency.Just as physicians cannot be legally limited to their scope of practice, neither does the American Board of Medical Specialties have a monopoly on creating medical boards.As such, there are medical boards that are not recognized by the American Board of Medical Specialties.One such board is the American Board of Cosmetic Surgery. There is technically no residency in cosmetic surgery (there are fellowships in cosmetic surgery done after a residency). The great majority of training in cosmetic surgery is done in plastic surgery residency. Other specialties that also include some forms of cosmetic surgery during their training are ear, nose and throat, also known as otorhinolaryngology, and dermatology.You would think the majority of the members of the American Board of Cosmetic Surgery would be plastic surgeons. They are not. Very few plastic surgeons are members of the American Board of Cosmetic Surgery. The majority of their members come from different backgrounds like general surgery, OB/GYN, dermatology, internal medicine, emergency medicine, etc.I am not going to go on and on about which board is a real board and which board is a fake board. I will let the consumer figure that one out. I will say that both the American Society of Plastic Surgeons and the American Board of Plastic Surgery, which are the main political organizations that oversee plastic surgery, have spent much time and effort trying to educate the public as to what certification means and why it is important. Some would argue more could and should be done in terms of educating the public regarding board certification.So why does it matter if a doctor is certified? Being board-certified is no guarantee that a physician is going to be of the highest caliber, but it is a very rigorous process that is very difficult to achieve. For starters, it requires that you've completed residency or fellowship training. Anyone can practice medicine as long as they have finished medical school and completed one year of internship. That's generally five years of training. To put things in perspective, most plastic surgeons have had 10-13 years of training.One note on facial plastic surgery. There is a recognized board called the American Board of Facial Plastic Surgery. Most of their members are trained in ear, nose and throat, or otorhinolaryngology, and have completed a fellowship in facial plastic surgery.The great majority of surgeries done on the face and in the head and neck were developed by plastic surgeons. Over the years, otorhinolaryngologists and other specialists have evolved and incorporated many of those procedures into their own specialty.The first Nobel Prize given to a surgeon was to Joseph Murray, a plastic surgeon who performed the first kidney transplant. Today, a plastic surgeon would most likely not be given privileges to perform kidney transplants in any major hospital in the United States.Who is best qualified to do what procedure? I've tried to explain why board certification is important but that still leaves choices of which type of doctor.Here are my criteria:If a physician can offer all of the alternative procedures, can take care of any and all complications, did not learn the procedure by experimenting on people after weekend courses and has privileges to do the procedure in a hospital, they are qualified to do the procedure.There are many competent dermatologists, otorhinolaryngologists, etc., who do liposuction. Few, if any, of them are trained to do tummy tucks, mini tummy tucks, brachioplasties (arm lifts), etc.You may have heard the expression, "If you're a hammer, the world looks like a nail."Unfortunately, if someone only performs liposuction and not the other procedures, they are probably less likely to recommend a tummy tuck or arm lift even if those may be the better procedures. As one of my favorite teachers used to say, "If you want to be a plastic surgeon, you should go to plastic surgery school."Cosmetic surgery, in general, pays significantly more than any insurance-based procedure. Call it greed or just a desire to earn a good living, many physicians from different specialties want in on the action. As such, cosmetic surgery, which at one point was synonymous with plastic surgery, has been picked apart and gobbled up by many physicians, sometimes talented and sometimes not so talented, from different backgrounds. So do your research and look for board certification, understand the scope of practice and limitations of different specialties. My last recommendation is to choose a surgeon who has a lot of experience, good reviews, excellent before-and-after pictures and who is a patient advocate looking out for your best interest. That may be easier said than done, but that's what we should all be shooting for.Another one of my professors used to say, "Don't look for bargains when buying parachutes or cosmetic surgery."In the end, this is a situation of "caveat emptor".I hope I was of some help.Best of luck,Mats Hagstrom, M.D.