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Top 3 Plastic Surgeons

An independent publication on aesthetic and plastic surgery

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The Lead · Procedure Deep-Dive

The Décolletage: Why the Chest Ages on a Different Schedule Than the Face, Why Lasers Behave Badly Below the Jawline, and Why Sleep Lines Are a Mechanical Problem Nobody Can Inject Away

The chest is the most neglected square foot of skin in aesthetic medicine. It takes decades of windshield sun, it is covered by clothing that ends in a V, and it is built from skin so thin and so poor in the structures that drive healing that every device used on the face has to be dialed down before it touches the sternum. This piece covers why chest skin re-epithelializes slowly and scars badly, what the red-brown mottling with the pale patch under the chin actually is, why vertical chest wrinkles are creases from side sleeping rather than expression lines, what the evidence supports in order of how much it asks of the patient, and the specific settings conversation to have before anyone points a laser at your sternum.

September 20, 2026

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By The Editorial Desk

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10 min

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Procedure Deep-Dive

The Gummy Smile: Why a Few Millimeters of Gum Became a Cosmetic Complaint, Why the Cause Decides the Treatment, and Why the Popular Answer Wears Off Every Four Months

Excessive gingival display is one of the few aesthetic complaints where four completely different structures can produce the identical photograph. A hyperactive upper lip, a short lip, gum that never finished receding off the teeth, and a jaw that grew too long vertically all look the same in a smiling selfie, and each one has a different correct treatment. This piece covers how the millimeters are actually measured, what a few units of neurotoxin in the lip elevators can and cannot do, why lip repositioning surgery relapses, when the honest answer is a periodontist or an orthodontist rather than an injector, why jaw surgery remains the only permanent fix for the skeletal version, and why a lip lift can make the whole thing worse.

September 20, 2026 · 12 min

A woman seated on the edge of a treatment table in a bright clinical room, legs extended in soft natural window light, photographed from the side in a calm editorial style

Procedure Deep-Dive

Leg Veins: Why Spider Veins Are Usually a Symptom Rather Than the Problem, Why the Ultrasound Belongs Before the Needle, and Why the Ones That Come Back Were Never Treated at the Source

Spider veins on the thigh and ankle are the most treated and least investigated cosmetic complaint in the lower body. They are also, in a meaningful minority of patients, the visible end of a failed valve much further up the leg, which is why so many people describe a cycle of injections that work for a season and then repopulate the same patch of skin. This piece covers what venous reflux actually is and how it is measured, why duplex ultrasound decides the entire treatment plan, what sclerotherapy does well and what it leaves behind in the form of staining and matting, how thermal ablation and cyanoacrylate closure replaced vein stripping, where surface lasers genuinely help, and why the clinic that offers to start injecting on the day of your consultation has skipped the only step that determines whether the result lasts.

September 20, 2026 · 12 min

The City Guides

Top surgeons, city by city.

Short, considered editorial picks for the cities where aesthetic medicine has the highest concentration of practitioners doing distinct work. We add a city when we have done the reporting, not before.

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§ 01 · Editorial Standards

Choosing a plastic surgeon is among the few decisions that cannot be appealed. It deserves real reporting, not advertising dressed as a recommendation.

Top 3 Plastic Surgeons is an independent publication covering aesthetic and plastic surgery: the procedures, the advances in technique, and the surgeons doing the most considered work in the field. We report on it. We do not sell placement within it.

We do not accept paid placement, and we do not rank by advertising spend or by the volume of five-star reviews a practice can solicit. Our reporting draws on board records, peer interviews, outcomes data, and direct patient testimony, revisited as the field changes.

§ 05 · The Letter

One letter, every Sunday.

Each issue carries one new surgeon profile, one dispatch from the reporting desk, and an editor's note on whatever question we could not stop thinking about that week. No sponsors. No partner content. No reason to exist except the subject.

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