Revision Otoplasty - Washington, DC

Dr. Hopping is a very nice guy, but after 2 attempts at an otoplasty with him, I will let my results speak for themselves. I hesitated writing this review because he is such a nice guy, but I feel my experience should be shared. I cannot recommend my experience. I am now forced to see an otoplasty revision specialist to correct telephone ear (over correction of mid section) along with possible skin grafts to correct some pretty bad scaring. The skin split on both ears 1 month after second surgery - other surgeon stated this was possibly related to receiving steroid shots 2 weeks prior to second surgery to help with scarring, which likely weakened the collagen and therefore affected the healing process. Recommend doing your homework and using a surgeon who has lots of pictures of previous results, and doesn't use older Converse Technique or Mustarde Suture Technique, but newer techniques which have minimal scarring. Also, if your consultation is rushed then your surgery will likely be rushed. It takes time and attention to detail to do a good job, and that goes for everything, including facial plastic surgery artistry.

I received an initial otoplasty on May 5th of 2017 to pin back my ears a bit since I was always self-conscious about them protruding, especially at the top part of the ear. After two or three months my ears essentially went back to normal, and on top of that I had some pretty bad looking scars back there which were quite noticeable. I went in to discuss this with my surgeon a couple times and he gave me some steroid shots to help with the scarring, which it did in fact help, however my ears still protruded quite a bit. I then rescheduled my revision otoplasty on December 12th, which went quite well and the surgeon said he pinned them back even further, however after the surgery I was a little concerned because it seemed like he almost sewed my ears to the side of my head rather then doing the proper procedure of weakening the cartilage around the antihelical fold so that that fold is increased (remember the top portion of my ear was my biggest concern since that was the part that stuck out the most). I am not sure if this is the cheap, quicker, lazier way to perform ear pinning surgery or not, but based on YouTube videos that I watched it definitely seems like it was the cheap way of doing it. One month after the December 12th surgery, on or about January 12th, as my left ear slowly moved away from my head a little bit (a little back towards natural position), my skin split in between my ear and head leaving a very gross looking open wound. I went and saw my surgeon about this and he said that a stitch must have come out and that there is really nothing that can be done about it and that I would need to wait for it to heal from the inside out, rather than the outside in. He said no stitch could be placed on it. See the pictures below as examples. Fast forward one week further, and low and behold, the same thing has now happened to my right ear as well. Was this the cause of this cheap or quick way of performing the surgery? Also he gave me steroid shots in my ears about 2 weeks before the revision surgery. I am not sure if that played any sort of part as well due to it possibly weakening the skin. Any insight would be greatly appreciated. I am not too happy about these open wounds that have developed in the back of my ears do to the skin splitting over a month-and-a-half after surgery.