Corbett Cosmetic Surgery: Precision, Passion and Creativity

The Voice-Tribune – August 14, 2014

Plastic surgery is a big decision. It’s both a financial choice and a physical one. So when it comes to making your mind up about whether or not to get a procedure, it’s best to talk to someone with decades of experience, skill and a track record of performing to perfection. One such surgeon in Louisville is Dr. Lee Corbett of Corbett Cosmetic Surgery.

While some people may assume that plastic surgery can become routine, for Corbett, the real pleasure comes in the small variances in routine, the chance to express himself and in turn deliver something that ultimately leaves the patient happy.

“It’s fun and creative in the sense that if you’re doing heart surgery, you’re like a high-tech plumber,” Corbett joked. “But with plastic surgery, you learn the basic principles and do them slightly differently for every single person. There is a little more creativity and it’s a little bit more free-form.”

Dr. Lee Corbett of Cosmetic Surgery

It’s freedom that ultimately led Corbett to pick plastic surgery once he finished his undergraduate studies at Vanderbilt, medical school at University of Louisville and general surgery residency in the Tennessee system.

“It was really an evolution,” Corbett said. “In general surgery, you focus on certain areas, but the best thing about plastic surgery is the creativity. You get to operate on the whole body. We’re probably the only specialty that gets to operate on head, neck and trunk extremities, so that’s kind of fun and it’s creative.”

It’s this passion and the chance to make people happy with, sometimes, the smallest of changes to their appearance that has led Corbett to become one of the leading surgeons in the city of Louisville.

“Peoples’ appearance and their money and their health are just about the most important things to them,” Corbett said. “For most people, plastic surgery is a process, and it’s very rare for someone to just roll in on the spur of the moment. People come here because they have thought about it and researched it, so it’s also fun to be part of a big decision like that.”

While plastic surgery may get a bad rap from certain corners of society, Corbett is quick to dismiss that – mainly because there are so many satisfied and happy patients that he’s seen over his 18-year career.

“A lot of people have a problem with plastic surgery until they have a problem that it can fix,” he said. “And all of a sudden it’s not so bad. But just look at the 35-to-50-year-old group of women. They’re not out to impress anybody. They’re not doing it for a significant other. Overwhelmingly, they want to look good in their clothes for themselves. They’re doing it for self confidence.”

One aspect that Corbett insists sets his practice apart is the fact that his is the only one in the city and state in possession of a SmartLipo laser that, while an invasive procedure, minimizes the pain and speeds up the healing process with results just as effective.

“The thing that we have that nobody else in the state has is a SmartLipo machine and it’s a laser liposuction procedure,” he said. “The laser melts the fat, and that means I can break up and remove the fat in a much gentler way.”

In the end, Corbett is just happy that he’s able to help patients regain confidence, self-assurance and pride in their appearance – the most satisfying part of the job.

“The patients have their own expectations,” he said. “Some are realistic and some are not. So a lot of the job is trying to understand those expectations.

“The real fun is meeting those expectations that patients have,” he said. “It’s fun to see happy people come back in here. We get some calls saying ‘You’ve changed my life. I used to hate this feature and felt self-conscious, and now I just feel so much better.”

Excerpt from Voice-Tribune article by Igor Guryashkin