What’s In (and Out) So Far in 2025

Monique Ramsey (00:04):
Spring is in full swing. And whether you're ready to refresh your look or just love keeping tabs on what's trending, we've got all the juicy details from fresh faced millennials to natural looking curves and some game changing fat freezing news. You're going to want to hear all of this. So joining me today is someone who's usually behind the scenes, Hannah, our copywriter and podcast assistant producer. Hey Hannah.

Hannah (00:31):
Hey, happy to be here.

Monique Ramsey (00:33):
You're the one who's going to tell us some of the trends that you are seeing online. I'll tell you some of the ones I'm seeing online and we'll sort of get to the bottom of some of these trends. There's a lot out there and who's to say what's real, what's not real? So we'll get started. So trend number one is millennials are getting a head start and we're talking about aging. So something we're seeing a lot of at La Jolla Cosmetic is younger patients, especially in their thirties and forties coming in for procedures that we used to think of for the 60 plus crowd. So what's going on?

Hannah (01:09):
Yeah, so this is not necessarily anything new, but it's just getting more and more popular. It's this idea of pre rejuvenation. Some people hate the term, some people love it, but it really just means attacking things before they fully settle in. Just getting them before they get too bad to be noticeable. And people are just doing smaller procedures earlier so that later on they don't have to just go get a huge procedure to play catch up. It's really literally anti-aging. You are avoiding it before it starts.

Monique Ramsey (01:42):
It's sort of like the preventative maintenance on your car.

Hannah (01:46):
Exactly. You just got to check in every few months, for a car, it's not every few months, but for you it is.

Monique Ramsey (01:53):
Yeah. But having the little tweaks, then you are in that you've suspended at this certain age when you see people and you're like, how does she never age? Well, she's probably doing something, it's just not drastic. And I think back in the day, maybe boomers are pre boomers even, their parents waited till you retired at 55. Can you imagine? I'd be long gone. I would've retired by now.

Hannah (02:21):
55?

Monique Ramsey (02:23):
Then you maybe bought a boat or you got a vacation home and then you had a facelift and it was like these moments in life or these milestones, and now it's just sort of like people are just tweaking and doing a couple things and I think it's a better way really. And what kind of procedures are you seeing that they're doing?

Hannah (02:46):
Well, eyelid surgery is one of the biggest ones because it's so subtle, but it doesn't have, as long as a recovery as a full on facelift, but it's treating that first sign of aging that a lot of people experience the eyes. I'm already worried about my eyes and I'm 25. My mom is your age and she's constantly worried about her eyes. That is everyone's first thing that they worry about. And so how amazing is it that there's a procedure that specifically targets that, that has, it's not too bad of a recovery and it looks totally undetectable. It just looks like you did a couple decades ago. That's it.

(03:33):
And then the other one is the mini facelift or short scar facelift. I'm seeing a lot of that for people in their, it's insane, but people as young as their thirties are considering it and mostly people in their forties end up getting it. There was a recent Hulu special that you and Dr. Breister talked about on an episode a while back, and there was a girl that wasn't much older than me. I think she was maybe in her early thirties if that, who was already getting a mini facelift. She already got one because she dissolved her fillers and she noticed she needed a boost. It's a totally undetectable surgery. Not a lot of doctors recommend it when you're in your early thirties, but I mean, if it works for you, if you meet with a doctor and they think it is necessary, it can be super helpful. And then for men, there's the standalone neck lift. I mean, that's pretty popular too, because they don't really want to worry about the incisions, but we're going to talk a little bit more about that later.

Monique Ramsey (04:39):
Yeah, we're going to talk about that neck lift. But speaking of men, I think you hit on something with the eyelid lift. And an eyelid lift is honestly the best bang for your buck in surgery. And you can do it earlier if you have extra skin and they can customize it. So maybe you just have extra skin on your upper lids, not extra fat. Some people have a lot of bulk up there, sometimes you don't. Sometimes it's maybe it's just your lower or just your upper or both, but they can kind of tweak it to what you need. And that's going to last a long time. Like you said, it's one of those procedures that it's not a huge recovery time. The investment isn't that big, but the payoff is really big. And so I think, yeah, when you're in your mid thirties and you've got some hooding that's going to make you seem tired or people might say, oh, are you tired? Or get sick of people asking you why you're tired. You're not tired

Hannah (05:36):
Or angry.

Monique Ramsey (05:37):
Or angry.

Hannah (05:37):
I'm not mad.

Monique Ramsey (05:39):
And the other thing is Botox can lift a little bit, but sometimes depending on how the Botox is done, sometimes you do get a little extra sagging. So it's like what's going to be the best way? And eyelid lift is going to just take away that extra skin, tighten things up. Sometimes they can do laser with it, maybe laser under your lower lids. There's all kinds of little tweaks and customizations. But I think that mini facelift we talked about actually on a couple episodes, and recently Dr. Brahme talked about it because a mini facelift is just going to be the skin. It's very superficial, it's not going to last very long, but it doesn't have the downtime, it doesn't have the expense. And so for the right patient, that trade-off might be worth it. It just depends. But I am seeing it sort of all over social media. So what do you think is sort of the advantage, I guess, of the pre rejuvenation movement?

Hannah (06:38):
It's really just targeting it as it comes slowly but surely, instead of playing catch up when you're in your sixties,

Monique Ramsey (06:48):
We have another trend, the did she or didn't she, era. And what we're talking about here is curves, and it depends on where you live. But here in San Diego, it's never been crazy in terms of big bold curves. But we're definitely seeing across the United States, big bold curves and on the BBLs used to be sort of everywhere. And now it's much more subtle. And even on breast augmentation, much more subtle, more natural looking results that leave people guessing. What are you seeing?

Hannah (07:23):
Yeah, so I live in Los Angeles, so lemme tell you, I've seen a lot. When I first moved here in 2021 on Rodeo Drive, I would see the most extra, if there's any other word to describe it, that's the one word I'm going to use, dramatic, extra BBLs ever. But I will say I'm seeing it a lot less than I used to. I was just in Beverly Hills on Friday and I thought, oh, here we go. I'm going to see all these crazy BBL's. But everybody looks pretty undetectable, just people are, I think the goal is to kind of leave people guessing instead of, oh, she definitely had work done. It's like, does she have a good workout routine or a really good doctor?

Monique Ramsey (08:09):
Right, right. Yeah. And I think that's nice. And plus what always left me, the first place I went to when I would see somebody super extreme in terms of their BBL is like, how do you find pants that fit? There must be websites where, or you take everything to get altered. How do you fit in normal clothing? I don't get it.

Hannah (08:31):
Custom. It has to be custom.

Monique Ramsey (08:34):
But I think now it's like, okay, the curves, it's more, and we talked about this with Dr. Swistun on the 360 lipo, where it's like you're moving your fat around, you're not necessarily throwing it away. You're going to move it around from somewhere where you don't love it to somewhere where you're going to really enjoy having that pretty curve and proportion. And even the breast implants, smaller sizes are being requested or just like a little extra fat put in. Not anything outrageous, which I think is good because long-term that's heavy, i that seems heavy.

Hannah (09:13):
Going to need a really strong breast lift maybe with some mesh down the road with that one.

Monique Ramsey (09:19):
Down the road. Yeah, because your skin's going to stretch out. Alright, so that leads right into trend number three, because summer bodies are made in the spring people, it's time. If you're thinking about lipo and wanting to light even things up and have your curves be in all the right places, take away too much if you've got it. So 360 lipo is a big deal. And so Hannah, tell us about what you're seeing online.

Hannah (09:47):
I mean, lipo has been a big deal for a long time, lipo alone because it targets specific areas of concern. But now 360 lipo, I mean it's been around for a few years now as a popular thing, but right now it's crazy popular because it sculpts the sides, it sculpts the front, it sculpts the back, it sculpts the entire torso. It's that undetectable word again. It looks totally undetectable. It looks like you've just been in the gym eating your protein. It literally looks so good. And Dr. Swistun just had a patient who was already big into the gym all her life, but she just with age, she ended up with some stubborn back fat. And then Dr. Swistun was like, let's just bring your whole body back from the front to the back and it looks amazing. It looks totally natural. And she said she just looks, she has the body of her twenties back

Monique Ramsey (10:45):
And she's 40 and she looks incredible. Having that great workout routine is something that's important, especially for your health, but also to keep your results. You want to invest, you're investing time, you're investing money, you want to keep it up. And so having those good habits is huge. But yeah, moving it because it's so weird as we age, you end up with fat in places that you weren't expecting. And no matter how healthy you are or what you're doing, sometimes it just ends up in a place you don't want it. If you move it, if you do 360 lipo and that you do some fat transfer where you move some from one place to a new place, then you end up really treating the whole body in a way that is so much more natural. And I guess that seems to be the word of the day today, right?

Hannah (11:37):
Yeah. We've been saying that over and over again today, but that's literally what everyone's going for lately. It's definitely the undetectable era of plastic surgery.

Monique Ramsey (11:47):
We have a podcast that we did, right, about 360 lipo, what surgeons won't tell you. We'll put it in the show notes because I think it's really important to do your homework about these procedures. Don't just listen to us.

Hannah (12:03):
All surgeons do them differently. Dr. Swistun's technique, that's what that episode is about, he has a very specialized technique. He flips patients in different ways compared to most doctors. So he's actually treating, he's getting more of that stubborn fat than he would if he only put you in two positions. He does three positions.

Monique Ramsey (12:25):
Three positions.

Hannah (12:27):
It's just genius. Genius.

Monique Ramsey (12:28):
Yeah, it really is. It really is. It takes more time for the surgeon, it takes a little more time in surgery, but if you're going to be in there.

Hannah (12:34):
You're going to be there anyway.

Monique Ramsey (12:36):
Why not tackle it all? That's where I'm at. So trend number four is something that we've been talking about lately because it's new to our practice. They're not new to the market, but they're new to the United States. So Motiva, breast implants, and they're a company out of Brazil. They've been available for 14 years I think. So there's a lot of safety studies on them, but they're new to America. So I think late last fall they came, we added them to our toolbox of wonderful implants, and they're doing a rebate right now. So if you have surgery before the end of May, you get a $250 rebate from Motiva. So it's kind of fun, and it's a collaboration they did with Meghan Trainor and she's a mom and had a mommy makeover and chose to use the Motiva breast implants. You told me about this, Hannah. You're seeing it everywhere. Tell me about what you're finding.

Hannah (13:36):
I mean, all of the doctors that I work with, all of our clients, they are slowly but surely getting onto the Motiva wave. They're adopting them in their practices and every single one has been so pleased with them. They are already getting so much excitement from patients during consultations because the Motiva ones, the thing about them is, well, there are two options, but both options feel incredibly natural because of the advanced materials that they're made of. So there's the round that would be more for somebody who wants that dramatic projected look. And then there's the ergonomix that kind of just moves with you and looks like a natural breast no matter what. And it's just amazing that it has both of these options, yet no matter what, it feels more natural than the implants we're used to. So everybody's kind of jumping on the wave here, and I'm really excited to see how they hold up.

Monique Ramsey (14:36):
And one of the things that is very cool is the way that they are textured. They were thinking at one point that if it's textured, it'll stay in place better. Especially those teardrop implants that they used to have on the market. You don't want a teardrop implant flipping around on you and being a teardrop in the wrong direction. So they thought, okay, if we texture it, it's going to grow into the tissue better, blah blah, blah. Well, that didn't turn out to be the case. And so the textured implants are gone, but the Motiva implants have a very fine texture that's almost like smooth. Your body thinks it's smooth and it sits in the capsule much better. Your body doesn't react to it in a very inflammatory way. And so what they're finding is the incidence of capsular contracture where your body makes too much scar tissue around that implant is far less with these implants. It has to do with this very small amount of texture that's on there that your body doesn't recognize as the implant in the same way as some of the older ones. So those things are going to have to be borne out in studies across the United States, but in their 14 years that they've been doing it, that capsular contracture rates like 0.4% or 0.6% is really low.

Hannah (15:57):
There is another thing that is exciting about the risks, how they're so much lower. So implants were being placed under the muscle for a lot of surgeons were choosing it to do it that way because it looks more natural. But that hurts patients more. It causes a longer recovery. Typically the Motiva implants, what's so great about them is that they can go over the muscle but still look totally natural and you don't see the shape of them. So it's really, really great for athletes who maybe they lift weights, they're doing bench press, they don't have to worry about the implant feeling weird or looking displaced.

Monique Ramsey (16:40):
When you flex that, it's popping the implant up to the side under that muscle, that pectoralis major, I think muscle. Yeah, and I think in the 33 years I've been in this business, it was like they always were trying to crack the code on capsular contracture rates and getting them down. And probably when I started it was like 30 40% of people with the capsule would get too thick and too constricted. And so that's when you hear somebody has a hard, my implants got hard. Well, the implants are not hard. It's the area around the implant. It's like squeezing on that implant and it becomes painful

Hannah (17:21):
Rejecting it.

Monique Ramsey (17:23):
And so your body's building up too much, it's going crazy in the scar tissue department. And so over time, they were trying to think, okay, if we put it under the muscle, maybe that'll decrease the risk or if we do over or, I mean it's been every which way, textured smooth. And so Motiva I think has kind of got this figured out and with this very small micron level of texture that your body doesn't see as textured. And there's other implants out there. We have a whole bunch of them. We have the natrell implants and those are terrific, soft touch, I think there's a whole bunch of different ones and for everybody's different, your breasts are different, and so maybe your objectives. Motiva might be great for you. It might not be great for you, but at least it's one of those things where we have it available and for people who are interested in trying it, it's a choice. It gives you more options.

Hannah (18:19):
It's another option. We love having lots of options.

Monique Ramsey (18:22):
Exactly. Exactly. So again, if you look on our website and we'll put a link in the show notes about the Meghan Trainor $250 rebate through the end of May. So it's a good time to get your breast aug if you've been thinking about it because summer's coming. You can enjoy the warmest weather coming up with a couple new curves. We'll give you all those details in the show notes. Alright, tell me about another trend, Hannah .

Hannah (18:48):
T-Z Plasty. Dr. Salazar specializes in the T-Z Plasty which has specific incisions that are hidden very well and they only really are taking care of that part that a lot of people are specifically worried about, which even a lot of times women, they see the neck first. They're having that problem first and they're like, I don't want to get a facelift yet. I just want to treat the neck. And we'll deal with that later on. Well, this is amazing for men and women who are only worried about their neck.

Monique Ramsey (19:18):
That extra skin that you could pinch and pull. And especially I think if you don't have the fullness but you have the extra skin. We did talk about it on a podcast recently. Dr. Salazar gave us some updates on the technique and who it's best for because at first he was really thinking, okay, this is going to be great for men. And then he had some female patients who are interested in doing it. He's like, okay, let's try, amazing results. And the people, it's not for everybody, but it is a great procedure that does help take care of that Turkey gobbler. And even though the incisions have nothing to do with your jowls, the jowls get better because of how the skin is pulled tighter and they sort of get, I don't want to say disappear, but on one of the before and afters I saw they were really kind of gone. You would've thought she got a lower facelift, but she didn't She only had the T-Z Plasty.

Hannah (20:16):
That's why I mentioned jowls because I know it's not meant to target jowls, but when I've seen them before and after photos, I'm like, their jawline got sculpted too. It's insane.

Monique Ramsey (20:26):
It really is. And it's interesting because of even though the scar or the incision and so the scar is right in the front of the neck, the way it's shaped helps it sort of just blend in and nobody's going to be like, what the heck is happening there? It just heals very nicely. And I think that's kind of a fun win that you could, especially for men don't have a lot of extra hair to hide other incisions or maybe they're bald, they can't have a facelift, but they still want to address the area that bothers them, which is typically that lower face and neck. This will help that. So we'll put those in the show notes because a fun podcast that he really goes into how it works and who it's for. Now tell me about our next trend.

Hannah (21:22):
Well, you're going to have to take it away with this, but this one blew my mind. So we're talking about banking our fat for future use. Can you tell me a little bit more about this?

Monique Ramsey (21:33):
Okay, so one of the things with fat and fat transfers is that you can take fat from one place and you can move it to another in that same surgery, but not all of it's going to stick around. Some of that fat is just not going to survive in its new home because the fat has to get vascularized. So let's say you're going to put it in the breast or you're putting in the buttocks. If you put a big blob of fat in, how does the middle of that blob get happy in its new home, get blood vessels to get oxygen to be able to live it. So you have to do fat transfer very conservatively, and you have to build up slowly over time if you want to make, let's say a breast augmentation, just using fat, you weren't really able to do a very big fat transfer because again, it's got to be able to live.

(22:36):
So the solution is to bank your fat. So you have your surgery, you have your lipo, put a little in to wherever you want to put it, we're putting it in your buttocks, you're putting in your breast, you're putting it in your face, wherever it's going to go. You send the rest of the fat to the fat bank and it gets frozen. And then your doctor then just orders it up in, let's say in three months or four months or six months, whatever your plastic surgeon deems as the time period to do surgery number two, and then surgery number three. So your fat comes in, it's cleaned and processed in a way that helps it be more predictable for when you put it back in more viable. This is a way and they've really perfected it. It's a company out of the UK, they're coming out to America and using pilot practices and we're one of the pilot practices.

(23:37):
You have your surgery, then you're going to have the fat banking, and then you can use it for things either to finish that procedure, like let's say it's a breast augmentation only fat or a BBL over two or three or four sessions. But you only have to have the lipo once. In the past you had to have the lipo every time. You had to harvest the fat and put it back in and wait however long and harvest again. that's a lot on your body to go through. And I think the trend as we've been talking about all day today has been this all natural trend. And are you seeing that online in terms of what people are looking for?

Hannah (24:19):
Yeah, I honestly don't see very many dramatic looks anymore. We want to look natural, we want to look our very best. We don't want to look done. It's not a look anymore.

Monique Ramsey (24:31):
And for people who don't want to use an implant, let's say you want to build up the breast with your own fat, not an implant. That has to be changed out every so often.

Hannah (24:41):
And you said, if this is more predictable fat with fat banking, then that is the main concern with fat transfer breast aug is that the fat is unpredictable and you don't know how long it'll last. But if we're using it through fat banking, does that mean these breast augmentation results would be more predictable?

Monique Ramsey (25:03):
That's what I've been hearing from the doctors who've been doing it. And it's very interesting because since this company's been around in the UK since 2009 or oh eight, there's been doctors in Europe and in the UK who are doing all fat for breast reconstruction. So women who had a mastectomy and want to build up the breast slowly over time, not with an implant with their own fat. And there's a doctor in Italy and he does it in five stages. Can you imagine having to have five surgeries with, in terms of lipo, it just sounds awful. But if you had one surgery with a lipo and then you're building up that breast over time with something that's your own body, your own,

Hannah (25:55):
That's amazing.

Monique Ramsey (25:55):
product, I should say. Amazing. You're not putting something foreign in. And I think when you think about fillers, even especially fillers in the face, you could get a product that may stick around or behave, we dunno how it's going to behave over a long period of time. But with your own fat, it's your own fat and it's going to stick around. And I think this a way just gives you more options. And I think also for the people out there who don't want something foreign in their body, I think this is a good alternative. So stay tuned. We have an interest list if it's something that you think you might be interested in. So once we get up and going in our clinic, once we have pricing and once we have more information. But yeah, it's very cool. So look for the link in the show notes, if interested in fat banking, we are excited to bring it to you. Alright, so the last thing is financing. And I mean we've been using financing at the center since the mid nineties, early to mid nineties, so a long time because it has to be something you can afford. And making good surgery with great plastic surgeons, affordable is important. So Hannah, are you seeing more trends out there about people financing?

Hannah (27:17):
More and more people want to get a procedure and not have to drop all their money on it right then, right? So they'll apply for PatientFi and then they get accepted and they can pay over time for a treatment. It's like a car payment basically. Like I'm dealing with that right now. I just bought a new car and it's so easy and it can automatically come out of your account each month just a little by little. Instead of dropping thousands of dollars all at once. The thing that stops people from getting a surgery that they really want is most of the time the price. They can't afford to drop all of that at once. And the other is finding the right time in your life, pretty much. That's pretty much always another blocker. But a big thing is the pricing. And I am so happy that LJC is one of the places that supports that, and I think more and more LJC has been on it for a long time, but I don't think everybody has as long as us.

Monique Ramsey (28:17):
No, no.

Hannah (28:17):
So I think as, PatientFi and other companies similar to them become more and more popular and known, more and more surgery centers are offering this.

Monique Ramsey (28:29):
And PatientFi, let's say you want a mommy makeover or you want some facial rejuvenation, face, neck eyes, the whole shebang. You don't really know until you have your consultation what that's going to cost. But we do have price ranges on our website, ballpark estimates. You can pre-qualify on PatientFi with only a soft credit check so they don't ding you just for looking for window shopping. And what they'll do is you don't have to really know the exact amount. Let's say you think maybe it's going to be $20,000, well, you might get approved for $30,000. I mean, they're going to approve you for something like an amount, whether you don't have to use it all, but it helps you to be able to go, oh, well now I could maybe add that breast augmentation to my facial rejuvenation or a lift or some fat transfer.

(29:24):
It allows you to sort of open that up because maybe you have some money set aside or maybe you want to use some on a credit card, but then you might finance the rest. And it sometimes helps to make that more achievable. But I think the other thing that came to my mind is you see a lot out there about medical tourism people, if they think, oh, it's too expensive in America, I have to go to Turkey or I have to go to, to me, that's scary because if if everything goes right, great, you've paid less. Wonderful. But

Hannah (30:00):
There are so many horror stories, oh my gosh.

Monique Ramsey (30:02):
It's scary. And so are we going to go to another country just to pay less? Where this way maybe, yeah, maybe US prices are a little more, but you're getting the expertise of, at least in our case, board certified plastic surgeons in a fully accredited operating facility with board certified anesthesiologists. You're having the highest levels of care, but you're not paying this crazy amount. You're paying, okay, I can pay that over the next however many years. Or one of our things that we do is that up to 24 months no interest. So depending on what fits for you, I think there's a plan for you, whether it's you might be a 60 month fixed rate loan, more like a car loan. It might be that up to 12 months or 24 months no interest, but we help work with you so that you can say, okay, I can make this work and still feel confident that I'm in a place that will take good care of me.

Hannah (31:07):
That's so good that you mentioned the medical tourism thing because the safety is such a big issue right now. So this helps people get the procedures they want when they want, they don't have to wait for it, but they also know that they're going to somebody that they can trust.

Monique Ramsey (31:24):
Financing is something good. And we have, I think we've got a pre-summer savings spectacular on the website. You can save $500 on your procedure or you can use one of our amazing promotional finance plans. So it lets you choose. That's a good way. And Hannah, we should also put in the show notes the episode that we had with Janelle about financing. That's a really popular episode where she breaks down why it might be a good thing for you and how to use financing.

Hannah (31:55):
That's what I was thinking the whole time I was trying to talk about financing. I was like, I know a lot about financing, but I wish I could just put a snippet of Janelle in here because she really knows it all.

Monique Ramsey (32:06):
She does.

Hannah (32:06):
So we'll just, we'll put that in the show notes for you.

Monique Ramsey (32:08):
We'll put that in there. Well, this was super fun. If anybody is out there and you want to explore more, we have six brilliant plastic surgeons and you can chat with one of them. If you're not quite ready. I will say we have a new intermediate step, so maybe you're not ready to come into the office and sit down with one of our plastic surgeons, but you want to have a little bit of a consultation. We have a consultation, we call it a concierge consultation. You can set it up online yourself. It's in Calendly, so you can click a time that's good for you. Book it online and you'll meet with one of our patient care coordinators who can help you dial into getting some of those first questions that you have. She'll help you figure out ballpark prices. They do a really good job. And so it's time well spent. And for the people who just aren't sure yet, we can also put a link to that calendly, if you want to set up a little 15, 20, 30 minute chat with one of the patient coordinators, we have that option as well.

Hannah (33:17):
That's amazing.

Monique Ramsey (33:18):
Thanks Hannah. This was fun.

Hannah (33:20):
Thank you.

Monique Ramsey (33:21):
I hope everybody enjoyed it and we'll be happy to talk to you in person or whenever you're ready. And thanks for listening.

Announcer (33:29):
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