Your Complete Surgery Preparation Guide | Barrett Plastic Surgery Pre-Op Instructions
Barrett Plastic Surgery walks through pre-op and post-op instructions: quit smoking at least two weeks before, stop NSAIDs and alcohol, take their supplement regimen called "Before" for 15 days, and arrange a responsible adult to stay with you for six to twenty-four hours after surgery. Day-of rules include nothing to eat or drink after midnight and a shower with regular soap only.
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Congratulations, you've opened this video and you are preparing for your surgery very soon. We're really excited for you to have your surgery, and we have a few things we're going to go over to make sure that you're on the right track. First up, I want you to take care of your body prior to surgery because your body will take care of you after surgery. So first thing is to make sure that you stay relatively calm and even keel, taking things kind of easy. Maintain your normal exercise, don't do anything too stressful, and make sure you're getting really good sleep. I wouldn't do any extreme diets. Now is not the time to stress your body. Make sure you don't smoke at least 6 6 weeks prior to surgery if possible. Bare minimum is 2 weeks prior to surgery. Smoking will interfere with wound healing. All forms of alcohol should stop 2 weeks prior to surgery. This is important because increased alcohol intake prior to surgery can increase your risk of bleeding. Illicit drug use also must stop 2 weeks prior to surgery. Marijuana is okay if it's not smoked. Edibles are okay. Please avoid anything that can increase your risk of bleeding, mainly NSAIDs, ibuprofen, Aleve, high amounts of garlic, things like that, fish oil, 2 weeks prior to surgery. Patients age 40 and older on HRT should discontinue it at least 2 weeks prior to surgery. This can apply to transgender patients as well. Patients age 40 and older taking birth control should also stop 2 weeks before surgery. Some of you might be a little bit nervous or anxious prior to your surgery. That is okay. Some things I recommend is 4-7-8 breathing. So you breathe in for 4 seconds, hold it for 7 seconds, and slowly exhale for 8 seconds. That works great. It's really good for helping you just fall asleep at night as well. Another great option is to take a little bit of CBD, a little bit of CBD underneath your tongue. We make a CBD that's really good, CBD tincture that helps you relax, helps prevent anxiety. It's addicting, it doesn't get you high. It's also great for pain relief after surgery as well. You can get this before your procedure in our office or online at postoprecovery.com. One thing I do want you to do prior to surgery is to make sure you have a good supplement. This is one I recommend, I made myself. It's called Before. It's 4 of these capsules once a day for 15 days prior to your surgery to make sure that you are nutritionally optimized prior to surgery so that you can heal properly. Surgery is stressful, it puts a lot of stress on your body, so you want to make sure your body is optimized. Running a marathon, you don't just show up and run a marathon, you do a lot of training prior to that to make sure your body is ready. Kind of the same thing. Two products I recommend to lower inflammation for prior to surgery are Digestive Enzymes, MassLymes. Those you take 3 with every meal and they help lower inflammation in your body. It's just great, especially if you're considering an implant surgery. And also Microbiome Breakthrough. Take 1 scoop of this a day 2 weeks prior and then also afterwards to help restore your gut balance, especially after the antibiotics that you're provided for your surgery. If you're looking for great skin preparation several weeks prior to your surgery, especially if you're going to undergo breast augmentation, you got to try My Body Butter. It has vitamin E and a bunch of other ingredients that will help prevent stretch marks prior to your procedure. Now the day before surgery, make sure you don't You cannot eat or drink anything after midnight, okay? We can't do the surgery if you eat breakfast right before your surgery. The morning of surgery, you can brush your teeth with a small amount of water and toothpaste, but just make sure you spit. You can also take any necessary medications with a small sip of water. There's an anti-nausea medication called Emend. It's a single pill, and you will take that the morning of your surgery. Please remove all contact lenses, jewelry, piercings. Those can interfere with the surgical equipment. Shower the night before your surgery using regular soap, nothing harsh. Don't put anything on your body after showering, including lotions, deodorants, and soap. If any of the surgical sites are in hair-bearing areas, please make sure to shave that area gently prior to coming in for surgery. You get actually less surgical site infections that way. We are in Beverly Hills. We have one-way streets. We are in the center of Los Angeles. Please allow extra time to get here in case there's any traffic difficulties or transportation or parking issues. After surgery, Uber, Waymo, Lyft— it's not permitted. You need a responsible adult to take you home after surgery. If you don't have a responsible adult, we can get a nurse for you. To take you home, but we need to arrange that ahead of time. And we need somebody to be with you at least for the first 6 hours after surgery, but ideally 24 hours. On the day of surgery, please bring all of your medications with you. Have the bottles ready to go so we can go over every medication and supplement that you have so you're clear on your plan. Anybody that's going to be with you after surgery, they're great to have in the room at the same time we go over that. Make sure to ask your concierge about adding Exparel, which is a long-acting pain-injecting medication, to your surgery or getting an IV drip after surgery to allow better clearance of the anesthesia and help you recover faster. You can also ask about hyperbaric oxygen and red light therapy after your procedure as well. What to wear the day of surgery: wear loose, comfortable clothing, things you don't mind to get a little bit messy and are easy to get on, so things that zip up in the front and are loose and baggy. Also bring some slip-on shoes or some sliding shoes to make your footwear more comfortable and stable. Please arrive on time. There is a lot of steps that we need to do to make sure your surgery runs smoothly and you get the best possible care. There are a lot of things to coordinate on the day of your surgery, so please be patient, and we appreciate that. Okay, there are things that we're looking out for all patients and making sure things run smoothly. We will get to you and you're going to have a great, fantastic experience. Right before your surgery, you're going to meet with a nurse who's going to go over medications, get an IV started. You're going to meet with the anesthesia provider and you're going to meet with your surgeon to go over the plan and your details of your surgery. After your surgery, let your appetite be your guide. Start with liquids, see how you feel, and then work your way back up to regular foods. I would avoid spicy foods for the first 24 hours, but just see how your body feels. After your surgery, this is my favorite trio, okay? CBD tincture, CBD balm— you put that on topically— and magnesium to help relax muscles and everything, okay? So remember, these 3 things are probably the most important things to make you immediately comfortable after surgery. Try to avoid the narcotics, but do take the antibiotics as soon as you get home. Please make sure to watch our specific post-operative instructions for your procedure. So in summary, all you have to do is show up and we are going to take care of the rest. Sit back, relax. You made a great decision and you're going to do awesome today, and thank you so much.
