What is Zoomoplasty and why are people going for it?
- 15 Sep 2020
Lisa Gutierrez
Long before stay-at-home orders forced millions of us to talk to each other online, folks weren’t all that keen on what they looked like on Zoom. Heather Schwedel was one of them.
At one of her Zoom meetings, “a gargoyle” stared back at her from her laptop screen, Schwedel, who works for the online magazine Slate, wrote in December.
It was her face, which somehow looked a “dull shade of greige (you know, grey-beige).”
And, was one of her eyes “wonky”?
“I don’t think it’s especially vain of me or anyone else to worry about my on-camera grotesquery; video conferencing awakens the vanity in all of us,” wrote Schwedel, who, it must be said, exaggerated with that unkind assessment of her face.
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Seeing our faces in full Zoom, in fact, has been enough of a shock during the pandemic — when Americans are visiting with family, working, going to school, dating, getting married and even throwing a national political convention online — to send some of us to the plastic surgeon.
Members of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons across the country report increased demand for cosmetic enhancements, especially Botox injections and fillers that erase lines, wrinkles, crow’s feet and all those tell-tale signs of aging on the face. Patients are also inquiring about more invasive surgical procedures, including tummy tucks, breast augmentations and liposuction.
As Dr. Michelle De Souza, a plastic surgeon for the University of Kansas Health System, and her colleagues cleared a backlog of procedures after COVID-19 stay-at-home orders were lifted, she also began fielding “all these cosmetic consults.”
One possible reason?
“It is a Zoom thing,” said De Souza. “They are commenting on their appearance on the webcam or the computer, that they look tired, they look mean.
“I just think the camera sometimes is not flattering.”
Wearing masks has people focusing more closely on their eyes and foreheads — the parts of their face not hidden. “With a mask on it’s harder to express your emotions,” said De Souza. “So if all you’re seeing is just your brow that may be furrowed or scowling, you probably don’t look as happy as you feel.”
She said patients who were already curious about plastic surgery told her, “They’re at home not doing anything. They can’t go anywhere. They’re still, for these people, working, so they are making money but they can’t spend it.
“So with the downtime that’s kind of built in from them working from home, or not traveling, they’re like, ‘Well, let’s get this surgery done … this seemed like the right time.’”
“I’m a little sceptical about whether that alone drove anyone to plastic surgery, but for anyone who was already contemplating Zoomoplasty, it’s not like the loneliness and anxiety of this crisis was going to improve anyone’s self-esteem.
“It seems like having the time to recuperate while healing is just as or if not more important than the Zoom uglies as a motivating factor.”
It’s all about the face
Before COVID-19, Botox and other minimally invasive cosmetic procedures were growing at a slightly higher rate than surgical procedures such as face-lifts, the plastic surgeons society says, up 2 per cent from 2018 to 16.3 million performed last year.
The five most popular minimally invasive procedures: Botulinum toxin type A (Botox is one brand name), soft tissue fillers, chemical peels, laser hair removal and intense pulsed light treatment, a skin treatment that works similarly to laser therapy.
“Working from home, being seen a lot (and seeing themselves) via company video conferences, and having mask-wearing bring increased focus to certain facial features, I think a lot of people have had a tremendous amount of time to be super-critical of themselves,” Miller said in his statement. “They pick up on things they want to improve about their appearance.”
But do we really look that bad on Zoom (or Webex, Google Hangouts or whatever online mode our meetings take)?
“Zoom especially has shown many of us that it does matter, for example, the quality of your camera, the lighting, the position of your camera, which angle it’s looking at you from,” said Jeffers.
Tribune News Service