In 2016, I had upper blepharoplasty (eyelid surgery) done by Dr. Sterling. I've always had issues with excess skin on my upper eyelids, and decided it was finally time to do something about it. After an office visit, we went over what I could expect for results, and I scheduled the surgery.
The surgery itself was pretty uneventful, and initially it was difficult to tell what the final results would look like due to the swelling. For those not familiar with the procedure, essentially a slice of skin is removed from the upper eyelid, to make the eyes look more open and makes you look more "awake" and bright-eyed.
Over the next week as things healed and the swelling went down, I became concerned that I could see very little difference between how my eyes looked compared to the "before" photos I had taken.
I returned to his office to have the stitches removed, and I mentioned to the woman in charge of removing them that I assumed that I would see more of a difference as time went on. I could tell, by her hesitating tone and half-hearted reassurance that it "might" look better as time went on, that what I saw was what I was going to get. I was extremely disappointed to hear that, but it got even worse.
As I lay with my eyes closed waiting for the sutures to be removed, I heard the woman in charge begin to tell a young woman (obviously new in the office) step by step how to clip and remove the sutures. I was a bit concerned about this, but didn't want to make waves, so I let them continue. Unfortunately, it turned out that they were using me as a "guinea pig" to learn on! She didn't cut the sutures properly to shorten them before they pull them out, and she was pulling extremely hard on them trying to remove them, but because she hadn't cut them properly, they wouldn't pull out. This was EXTREMELY PAINFUL, and she did it several times.
The bottom line is this: I PAID TOP DOLLAR TO HAVE THIS PROCEDURE DONE, AND GOT 3RD CLASS SERVICE! At no time did anyone ask me if I would consent to being used as a human guinea pig so that their trainee could practice on me.
So, during my follow-up visit with Dr. Sterling, I expressed my extreme disappointment at the results. I showed him before and after photos that I had taken of the eyes, and it was a real struggle to see even a SLIGHT difference (with this procedure, the difference should be VERY noticeable...). I also mentioned that every person I shared the photos with agreed with my assessment. It's clear that he failed to remove enough skin to make a difference, which was confirmed by a second opinion I got from a very experience plastic surgeon in Massachusetts. Dr. Sterling simply stated that he was sad that I was disappointed with the results, and asked it there was anything more I'd like to know. I stated that yes, there was: how about refunding at least part of my fee, which I will put toward having the procedure redone properly? He balked at this, and said he'd "consider" a small refund only after I had it redone and depending on how much skin the second doctor removed. He did offer to redo the procedure, but I declined; with my face, you get ONE chance to get it right, and he missed by a long shot.
I also mentioned the very unprofessional job his staff did removing the sutures, and it didn't really seem to bother him too much. He seemed to just patronize me by saying he'd have "a word" with his staff about it, but it certainly didn't seem like it was a big deal to him. I stressed that no one ever asked me if they could experiment on me, and I got no response.
Needless to say, I can't recommend Dr. Sterling for any type of procedure based on my experience. There are plenty of good, capable cosmetic surgeons around, so do your homework and most of all, DO NOT UTILIZE DR. STERLING'S SERVICES. read more