I'm A Holistic Plastic Surgeon & These Are My 3 Must-Have Skin Care Tips

When the topic of plastic surgery comes up, I'm guessing you don't immediately think of alternative medicine or holistic healing. They seem quite incongruous with each other, no? Well, on my most recent episode of Clean Beauty School, I spoke with "America's holistic plastic surgeon" Anthony Youn, M.D., a board-certified plastic surgeon who has crafted a practice that's centered around proactive measures against skin aging, holistic body care, and a less-is-more approach to treatments. (And has quite the following on TikTok I might add). 

But...what does this mean in practice? Well, according to Youn, it's about educating people about all the prophylactic steps they can take to avoid having to go under the knife. Does that seem weird that a plastic surgeon wants to teach people how they can avoid plastic surgery? Maybe, but for Youn, he says it's all about beauty that starts internally. 

Do not invest in major treatments if you have no intention of paying mind to the day-to-day upkeep. For skin, that means having a consistent and smart skin care routine. Now, everyone will have different steps and ingredients that work for their skin, so there's no one-size-fits-all approach to skin care (much like there's no diet that works for everyone everywhere). But we can all at least adhere to the basics. 

"It's being realistic and starting with the simple stuff: Wash your makeup off at night, and those types of things. Once you get people past that, we can start considering other steps: Cleanse in the morning, apply an antioxidant serum, cream, and sunscreen," he says.

As Youn notes—and, well, as do we—nutrition is the basis for overall health and medicine. "I would start off with a clean diet: Eat the rainbow and limit the amount of the processed type foods that you eat," he says.

Remember how surgery should be viewed as a last resort? Well, there are plenty of other treatments you can opt for that aren't surgical. Professional-grade treatments have come a long way and can be safer alternatives, should you be at a place where you feel you want professional intervention. 

"Taking it to the next level, there are certain treatments that I think are very safe and that can make huge impacts on how people feel about themselves," he says. "So just for a quick example, IPL, or intense pulsed light, is a treatment that basically zaps away dark spots. This is great—and very safe—for people who got a lot of sun damage and now the sun spots won't go away." See, while we encourage people to be smart about sun care now, we also know that the same precautions weren't as popular in the past—so people may have residual pigmentation that they want to address.