The booming aesthetic industry will not be deterred, despite a current but temporary downturn in overall business, as new aesthetic technology and products will boost industry sales to $8.2 billion by 2012, according to a new Global Aesthetic Market (GAM) VI research report from Medical Insight Inc.

The report states that new skin tightening and body shaping devices, dermal fillers, and neuromodulators (such as Botox Cosmetic) will drive double-digit growth in the field. Highlights from the report include the following:

    * Skin tightening will expand by 21.3% per year, from $79.3 million in 2008 equipment revenues to $171.4 million in 2012;
    * Body-shaping devices will rise from $361.9 million in global supplier sales to $752.9 million by 2012, for 20.1% annual growth;
    * Dermal filler sales will expand by 15.6% per year from $822.6 million in 2008 to $1.4 billion in 2012;
    * Neuromodulators will grow by 14.8% annually from $898.6 million in 2008 to $1.5 billion in 2012, with the introduction of new products to compete with Botox.

Procedure volume for all aesthetic treatments will rise by 5.6% per year, from 81 million in 2008 to 101 million in 2012. During this time, total fees earned by practitioners will expand by 6.1% annually, from $31 billion to $39 billion.

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How does one rectify a botched nose job? These are patients who have already been to a surgeon and now must go to what is likely a second surgeon for a correction. In addition to possibly bad feelings about the first surgery's outcome, they carry a strong desire to see the problem fixed. Of all of the patients whose nose job outcome was a disappointment, those with over-rotated noses (turned up too much) or over-shortened noses are some of the most unhappy. According to Peyman Solieman and Jason Litner, two surgeons at Profiles Beverly Hills, this is a harder problem to fix but it can most definitely be accomplished. They offer insight at the Beverly Hills Rhinoplasty Surgery Blog:

So how is it that some rhinoplasties have such problematic outcomes? Many surgeons, shorten a long nose by removing the nasal spine and the front part of the septum. See the image below for details.

On the other hand, when we want to shorten a nose or rotate the tip, we focus on altering the shape of the tip cartilages themselves to create the contour we want. In this way we are able to provide a predictable result that does not weaken your nose (if anything, it makes it stronger).

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Some cosmetic surgeons are cutting prices -- at times slashing them -- in response to the economic slump. We see it happening as well in the car sales business, retail stores, and other venues hit hard by the recession. The OC Register's In Your Face blog looked at the nature of some of these deep-cut discounts (no pun intended).

However, just as patients need to be extra-vigilant to make sure they don’t end up with low-quality treatments as well as low-priced ones, physicians need to take special care not to undercut their business -- or their reputations -- with low-end price tags on high-end procedures.

Read about some of the discounts on cosmetic medicine area physicians are offering in the Southern California area.