Est. MMXXVIAesthetic intelligenceIndependent

Top 3 Plastic Surgeons

An independent publication on aesthetic and plastic surgery

Beverly HillsLos AngelesNew YorkMiami

The Lead · Procedure Deep-Dive

C-Section Scar Endometriosis and the Tummy Tuck: The Painful Lump That Flares With Your Period, the Belly Button Nodule, and Why It Has to Come Out Before the Skin Does

A firm, tender lump in a cesarean scar that swells and aches around your period is not a stitch or a stubborn bit of fat until proven otherwise. C-section scar endometriosis is uncommon, easy to miss, and badly suited to being swept away with the skin at a tummy tuck. Here is how it is recognized, how it is confirmed, why hormones only buy time, what wide excision and mesh mean for your abdominal plan, and how to sequence it with cosmetic surgery.

November 2, 2026

By The Editorial Desk

14 min

Old Facial Fractures and Cosmetic Surgery: The Sunken Eye, the Flat Cheekbone, the Plates You Can Feel, and Why Filler Is Not Always the Answer

An old facial fracture can leave a sunken eye, a flattened cheekbone, a numb cheek, or a plate you can feel under thin skin. Here is how surgeons tell a bone problem from a soft tissue problem, why the first weeks after an injury matter so much, what late correction actually involves, and when filler, fat, or an implant is a reasonable shortcut and when it is a cover over the wrong problem.

November 2, 2026 · 12 min

A woman in her thirties in a gray knit sweater sitting at a wooden table by a window with her chin resting on her hand, looking down at an open notebook beside a glass of water and a few pills, reflecting the planning behind body contouring after bariatric surgery

Procedure Deep-Dive

Body Contouring After Bariatric Surgery: When It Is Actually Time, Which Labs Matter, Why Bypass and Sleeve Patients Are Different, and What Your Plastic Surgeon Needs to Know

Body contouring after bariatric surgery is usually discussed as a question of loose skin. It is also a question of protein, iron, B12, and a rerouted gut. Here is what the 12 to 18 month rule really means, what weight stability looks like, which deficiencies are worth finding first, why the usual pain pills may be wrong for you, and which symptoms after surgery should never be blamed on the tummy tuck.

November 1, 2026 · 13 min

A woman in her fifties with wavy, graying blonde hair, wearing a white linen shirt with rolled sleeves, seated at a window with her forearms resting on the sill, gazing outside in soft daylight

Procedure Deep-Dive

Lymphedema and Cosmetic Surgery: Why an Arm or Leg Stays Swollen After Lymph Node Removal, What Elective Surgery Can Risk, When Liposuction Is Actually the Treatment, and What Lymphatic Bypass Can and Cannot Do

Lymphedema is not ordinary swelling, and it does not read like a cosmetic problem until someone tries to treat it as one. A limb with damaged lymphatics changes the calculation for any elective operation, and a thigh lift can injure lymphatics that were perfectly healthy. Yet liposuction, done a very specific way for a very specific stage, is one of the better-supported treatments for the disease. Here is how to tell lymphedema from lipedema and postoperative swelling, what the evidence says about blood pressure cuffs and needles, why cellulitis is the event to fear, and what to ask before anyone operates near an affected limb.

November 1, 2026 · 11 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.

2 featured · California

Beverly Hills

An editorial guide to the city's aesthetic medicine scene.

3 featured · California

Los Angeles

An editorial guide to the city's plastic surgery scene beyond the Beverly Hills triangle.

3 featured · New York

New York

An editorial guide to the city's plastic surgery establishment.

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

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.

Weekly · No cost · Leave at any time

Top 3 Plastic Surgeons

C-Section Scar Endometriosis and the Tummy Tuck: The Painful Lump That Flares With Your Period, the Belly Button Nodule, and Why It Has to Come Out Before the Skin Does

Old Facial Fractures and Cosmetic Surgery: The Sunken Eye, the Flat Cheekbone, the Plates You Can Feel, and Why Filler Is Not Always the Answer

Body Contouring After Bariatric Surgery: When It Is Actually Time, Which Labs Matter, Why Bypass and Sleeve Patients Are Different, and What Your Plastic Surgeon Needs to Know

Lymphedema and Cosmetic Surgery: Why an Arm or Leg Stays Swollen After Lymph Node Removal, What Elective Surgery Can Risk, When Liposuction Is Actually the Treatment, and What Lymphatic Bypass Can and Cannot Do