Surgery post-op: How long do I have to wait before going for additional surgery?

Please be absolutely certain to keep your health as your highest priority over any cosmetic issues. Have your Gyn MD perform the necessary surgery for your health and find out what is the diagnosis. You would know this within a week of surgery.

If it is benign, you could consider scheduling your cosmetic surgeries as early as in 6 weeks. If, however, your condition is not benign, please avoid any cosmetic surgery and focus all of your energy on the treatments you might need. Good luck!

All patients considering cosmetic surgery for any reason should be in their ideal state of health prior to undergoing any procedure.  Cosmetic surgery is a situation where we take people who are healthy and temporarily make them ill, with the anesthetics, post-operative pain, and recuperation involved. 

Since cosmetic surgery is not being done to correct any life-threatening condition, it should be done only with the nearly-certain expectation of a healthy recovery.  It is imperative that patients should not have any underlying medical conditions that might compromise their recuperation or add an unwarranted risk.

Competent plastic surgeons will always properly assess the general health of their patients prior to scheduling surgery.  If there are minor, manageable medical problems such as mild hypertension or diabetes, or moderate risk factors, such as COPD, the surgeon will generally enlist the help of an internist, specialist, or family practitioner to optimize the patient's medical status before surgery. 

Certain other conditions should be red-flag warnings to both the patient and the plastic surgeon that it may be wiser to postpone the plastic surgery until proper diagnosis and treatment can be undertaken, even if this means that the procedure a patient wants is postponed indefinitely.

Once a patient has made a full and healthy recovery from a required non-cosmetic surgery, or has taken the appropriate time to bring their underlying general health into proper regulation with any necessary medication, the patient should follow the advice of her regular physicians, working in concert with her plastic surgeon, to determine the advisability and timing of cosmetic surgery.

First thing's first, always place health over beauty!

Undergoing any surgical procedure is a serious decision.  Elective cosmetic surgery is exactly that - elective.  Under no circumstances should such surgery be performed if it may compromise a patient's health.

If a patient has a medical condition which needs to be treated, that must take priority over any elective cosmetic procedure.  Once the medical condition has been successfully treated and the treating physician provides a clean bill of health, then cosmetic surgery may be considered.

There is no magic number of months or years one needs to wait.  That is a judgment that needs to be made on an individual basis by the physician treating the medical condition.  That doctor must provide medical clearance to undergo elective cosmetic surgery.  Ultimately, waiting until one is in optimal health will result in an optimal outcome of both your medical condition and the elective cosmetic surgery.