Live from ABAM 2023 - Pt. 1

Dr. Grant Stevens

Hi everybody. Dr. Grant Stevens here from the Technology of Beauty. I'm here in beautiful Park City, Utah, home of ABAM, the American Brazilian Aesthetic Medicine meeting, and we're here in Park City at the meeting, as you can see, and we're gonna go interview various vendors and doctors here at the show. This show happens every year, and this is the 15th anniversary of ABAM.

It's a fantastic opportunity to learn from experts from all around the world. We literally have experts from all around the world here at the American Brazilian meeting, and we have the very best in the aesthetic industry. So come on, let's go see who's here this year.

Hi everyone, Dr. Grant Stevens here at Park City at the American Brazilian Aesthetic Medicine meeting, and we're filming here the Technology of Beauty. I want to share with you our next meeting where we're gonna be filming, and that's April 19th in Miami at the Aesthetic Innovation Summit. This will be our fourth meeting of AIS and we're gonna have a terrific time.

The schedule is packed with experts from around the country and actually even around the. So I encourage all of you to go ahead and register for AIS 2023 in Miami, Florida. See you there.

And with me today, right now, is the founder of ABAM. We're celebrating our 15th year here at American Brazil Aesthetic Medicine, and Dr. Renato Saltz is the founder right here. Can you believe it? The man of the hour, congratulations on your 15 successful years. You've brought people from all over the world, the best and the brightest to Park City once again, to lecture us and teach us and so forth. Thank you very much.

Dr. Renato Saltz

Thank you, Grant. Thank you. This is our second year interview. Congratulations for technology of beauty. Thank you. You continue to lead us and connect us with the industry in many different ways. So I really appreciate it. I told you that two years ago. I told you the last year, and I really congratulate you for continuing this amazing project.

Dr. Grant Stevens

It's a great opportunity for us all to do that and work together and bring industry and physicians. And extenders together. Absolutely. That's fantastic. So I would be remiss if I didn't note you have a cowboy hat on. Like you don't normally run wear a cowboy hat. Only one. He normally wears a scrub hat, in surgery. So why do you have your cowboy hat on, sir?

Dr. Renato Saltz

You probably know I grew up in South Brazil, my true culture and grew up riding horses. Today I ride horses in Heber and I enjoy that. When I ride horses, when we have our cowboy party at ABAM, I wear my Stetson.

Dr. Grant Stevens

So tonight is the Cowboy party and we have a mechanical bull. We have a beautiful band that's gonna be singing some country songs along with classic rock and roll, and we're all gonna get dressed up as the cowboys and cowgirls that we are.

Dr. Renato Saltz

You mentioned 15 years Grant, and I should mention the fact that I'm very proud of our project.

You've been involved with ABAM, you never miss an ABAM here or in Brazil. You have helped us so many ways by teaching us, by educating the audience, by bringing industry with us. And it's been a fantastic meeting. We are setting new records of attendance of industry, of workshops, of support to Image Reborn. So I couldn't be happier this weekend because it's all coming together.

Dr. Grant Stevens

You deserve, you and Flavia deserve it. Now, tell those few who don't know about Image Reborn, it's such a wonderful group organization that you formed. And all the proceeds, all the profits from this meeting go to Image Reborn. Not a single penny has gone to Renato. So please tell our listeners about Image Reborn. What is it?

Dr. Renato Saltz

Image Reborn is a nonprofit. It's a 501(c)(3) we started 25 years ago that provides three-day no-cost retreats to breast cancer survivors. So we're very lucky. We have some of the most beautiful homes in Park City, in St. George, in Denver, and soon in Houston, donated to the foundation for the weekends, and we bring 10 to 12 women, breast cancer survivors from all over the us, from Central America, some come from Europe. We have had some from South. They get together, they share, their pain, they share their psych, psychological issues, and we have a group of support that spend the weekend with them.

They go through massages, they go through skincare, they go through yoga, they go through, we bring chefs to cook for them. We have psychologists coming in. It depends on the group. We have young survivors group, we have stage four survivors. We have Hispanic retreats. We have we, we bring them together in, it depends where they are in the disease.

We even have a group of healthy women that just want to go back and help their fellow sisters. So it's been a very how attached I am to this foundation's been a very fascinating thing helping them to restore their lives, restore their happiness, restore, many things.

And we have had over 4,000 women through this retreat. And and now we have a whole army of volunteers, over a hundred volunteers that help the found. We have a group of facilitators, we have a board of directors, we have an advisory board many supporters from industry from individuals like yourself to keep the foundation going. And there's a lot of money involved in the weekends, to be able to take care of them.

Dr. Grant Stevens

How many weekends did you do in 2022?

Dr. Renato Saltz

In 2022 we did 26 retreats, we're planning 28 for 2023. Every year I pushed my.

Dr. Grant Stevens

That's more than one every other week. Now, in addition to the proceeds from ABAM, you also have an annual gala, black tie. I come to it. Tell us about it.

Dr. Renato Saltz

It's when we, it's a, we call celebration of life and we have had 24 of those, and it's usually October, breast cancer month, and it's a big party. And you have fun. You dance you, you cry. We have a lot of testimonials. We bring some of the survivors to tell the story. We have silent auction live. At the beautiful Stein Erickson Hotel, and that, that, that covers about two thirds of the year for us. So it's an important event and, everybody loves it.

Dr. Grant Stevens

And it's well supported, not just around the country and all, but locally here. I ran into one of the people, I have to be careful not to say her name, but I mentioned it to you, from the Sitka Fur Factory.

And she's someone you know very well. And she found out what I do and why I was here. And I was taking a fur back for Erin and I know her brother very well. And she said, oh, tell Renato, Dr. Saltz, hello from me. And we love to support his wonderful family.

Dr. Renato Saltz

Yes, and wonderful family. They have business in Alaska, in any Park City Main Street.

Dr. Grant Stevens

I'll plug them cuz I first plugged them Alaska and Sun Valley and asked, they call us. It's a Sitka fur factory and it's a wonderful family. And unbelievable supporters of this.

Dr. Renato Saltz

They never ask. They call us, we're ready. What do you want, what do you need? It's amazing what they've done for the foundation.

Dr. Grant Stevens

She called her brother Marcus down. Hey Marcus, come here. And somebody who knows Dr. Saltz. Awesome.

Dr. Renato Saltz

Yeah. I'm so glad. It's fun. Is a wonderful guy. Yeah, wonderful family.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Yeah, absolutely. So you're supported all over the world and you're many Char. What's next for Ronaldo Saltz? You've got a practice in Salt Lake City, a practice here in Park City.

You've got a fellowship, you've got skincare. You go a general skincare line what. Haven't you done? What are you gonna do next? And we got two grandchildren. Two grandchildren? That's I had met recently.

Dr. Renato Saltz

Yeah, you met them. Maybe Sun Valley and open something with famous Grant Stevens.

Dr. Grant Stevens

You could join me in Sun Valley Aesthetics.

Dr. Renato Saltz

I know I don't, I enjoy this kind of stuff. I enjoy organizing meetings. I'm done with both societies. I'm just past president, which is a wonderful position to me. And I think we, you and I made our contribution there. It is just to go back, get back to my patients maybe riding again and, enjoying surgery.

I, I really enjoy being in that little world.

Dr. Grant Stevens

I know you do. And you're passionate about it. I do want to mention to all of you also, there are only two living. And not only, there are two individuals in the history of mankind who've been the president of the International Society of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons and the American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery, and here is one of them.

You met the other one earlier, Dr. Foad Nahai. The only other living and nonliving person, is this man right here, Dr. Renado Saltz. You're very, you have lectured all over the world. You've brought education and patient safety to all the continents in the world. No hyperbole. And I want to thank you the whole society, both societies owe you a debt of gratitude.

Thank you. And you're on the trustees, the board of trustees, and we're about to pick a new director for the Aesthetic Society. And that's such an important role that you have. Very important. And yes, it is very honored. We've got the session to do next, and I need to put on my cowboy garb because then we're gonna dance and party like rock stars. Rock stars. Thank you so much my brother.

Dr. Renato Saltz

Thank you for this amazing crew. They've been with you for several years now. Unbelievable. And I watch every video he sent me and and you guys are amazing. So thank you for they are for this contribution. It's truly amazing.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Thank you very much.

Alright. Hello everyone. I'm Dr. Grant Stevens. I'm here in Beautiful Park City, Utah, home of the American Brazilian Aesthetic Medicine meeting or ABAM. We're here filming for the Technology of Beauty and with us tonight is Lloyd Mahaffey. Lloyd welcome.

Lloyd Mahaffey

Hi, Grant. Great to be here.

Dr. Grant Stevens

It's great to have you here. Lloyd is the CEO of Engaged Technologies. He's also the chairman of the board of a, a security company called Critical Security that you're gonna hear about shortly. Why don't you tell us first a word about Engage and then we'll go to cybersecurity?

Lloyd Mahaffey

Sure. Engage is a unique company based outta Boise, Idaho, with offices around the world.

And what we do is we close the gap between what patients need to understand and what physicians are trying to explain with their procedures. We do it through short form video and we push it out to them right at the height of interest time of need.

Dr. Grant Stevens

That's cool and we're gonna hear more about that at this show and also when you're on the program down in Manhattan Beach

in the big studio. Exactly. As I'm gonna be speaking on Monday here at the show on cybersecurity and my own personal cyber attack on my practice Marina plastic surgery, and what I went through and what I've learned from it, and how I can help other surgeons and physicians and other medical practices avoid some of the trauma from a cybersecurity attack. Why don't you tell us a little bit about Crytica, where you're the chairman of the board and a little bit about the risk we encounter with cybersecurity.

Lloyd Mahaffey

Sure. Ever since my days at Apple, we've known that there were certain parts of the computer technology that could not be easily protected.

But cybersecurity has become a global. Massive business. Yet at the same time, companies keep getting hacked over and over again and paying ransomware, hospitals, hotels, consumer product companies are getting hacked. The question is why? What everybody doesn't understand is there's a thing called dwell time.

So when malware first arrives on your network and sits in your server and your computers for about 200 days, it does nothing. It watches very carefully, your keystrokes, your passwords, all your information, and doing nothing until it's ready. It's got everything it needs. Then it starts the catastrophic attack.

At that moment, it's too late. You've been hacked, your data's gone, and you're gonna pay somewhere between five and $20 million to get it back. Crico focuses on that area called dwell time. The average time to detective Malware in the United States, according to IBM, is about 187 days. We invented technology that develops at an 18 milliseconds, milliseconds, dramatically closing the gap.

Now we spot it right away. We don't know what it is yet, but that's okay cuz we isolate immediately notify the security team and they start trying to identify what it is. But changing the dwell time from 180 days to 18 milliseconds is an extraordinary change in cybersecurity. We think it's gonna be a big deal.

Dr. Grant Stevens

I can't believe you could change something from 180 days to 180 milliseconds. Who has this been installed? Are you using it? Is the government using it? What's going on with the technology?

Lloyd Mahaffey

We just started deploying. We finished our technology this summer, just started our deploying. We've actually got a number of things unfolding.

We're in discussions with most of the Eastern European countries. Facing Russian malware right now to help them protect from that. We're being deployed in a number of US operations that are both government oriented as well as the private sector, but I think we're just at the beginning of what's gonna happen.

A lot of people are waking up for the first time because the Department of Homeland Security is now saying, our biggest threat is dwell time. That gap we've talked about. So suddenly everybody's realizing they spend a lot of money on cybersecurity. They still have threats, still have.

Dr. Grant Stevens

So we all spend money on these various Norton and various other cybersecurity packages and so forth. You're telling me they don't help with dwell time?

Lloyd Mahaffey

It makes you feel good because at some point when it finally starts its attack, they spot it. Or a lot of these technologies focus on things they've seen before. So without having some history, they don't know what to really look for. It's like trying to predict what the flu strain's gonna be next.

And create a vaccine for it. Okay. So they try to predict what the malware might look like, but they're not sure. So that's one of the problems. So by the time it attacks, it's just too late. In our case, we don't care what it looks like. It's a change of states. Something new has arrived. We don't know what it is yet, but let's isolate it and find out.

Dr. Grant Stevens

It's from the point of having a lot of false positives?

Lloyd Mahaffey

We have no false positives, which is an interesting assertion to make in a medical community because that's a big deal. But for the first time, we can say that whatever we find is new. It didn't come from the admin, didn't come from the oem, which will be like a Microsoft, so it's new and something that shouldn't be there.

So then we can notify the team right away and say, what is that? The thing we can do is we can isolate or air gap that device while we figure it out. We don't turn it off. We just disconnected it from the network. And so that's protecting in a very different way.

Dr. Grant Stevens

I know in my case, the dwell time was 156 days. They invaded me with a malware. I was unaware of it. And 156 days later, they started shutting down my 38 terminals. They took over all my photographs. They took over all my financials, all my surgery schedule. They shut me down entirely. I was reduced to pencils and a daytimer. I had no idea who had paid what.

Lloyd Mahaffey

Unreal.

Dr. Grant Stevens

It was a complete shutdown. It cost well over a million dollars. They contacted my patients. The high profile patients, they threatened to show their pictures. If I didn't give them $536,000 in bitcoins that like week we had a number of people in the office and I can go into it later. I'm gonna present it on Monday, just what we did.

The most important thing I can tell physicians is to get plenty of insurance. Thankfully I had a lot of cyber insurance. Most physicians are way under-insured. But back to your Crytica technology, that would've saved me. As I would've known 156 days earlier to kill that computer. And just throw it in the ocean.

Lloyd Mahaffey

One of the things that, you could do that, that would work really well. That's a good idea. But I think what you could do is keep in mind that when malware first arrives on the computer, it takes about four hours for it to set itself up and be prepared to make a jump to the next device.

Okay, so you've got about a four hour window to intercept and stop that, which is why it was so important to us. We catch it fast. Now, one of the things we did, which is unusual, the average agent size in malware is 1.2 gigabits. It's big, okay? Which is why most people run their malware software at night while they're asleep because it's so big.

It's very heavy. We designed a probe, which is smaller than an agent 70 kilobits in size, tiny. So for the first time, we can fit something into a computer, a server, a printer, set up box, a ring doorbell. You could put in a ring doorbell, light bulb. And so when you talk to the Department of Homeland Security, the thing they're most worried about is not the big data centers.

They're worried about what they call the edge of the network, the control system that control the natural gas plant, the water system, the power grid. Those are small control technologies, and that's where the real threat is. Cause if I turn off the water of a community, I can shut the community down and turn off the power.

So for the first time with a 70 kilobit probe, we can put these in the small control devices and begin to protect the edge of the network. That's a whole new market opportunity that doesn't even exist right now.

Dr. Grant Stevens

So where can I sign up? Where can the surgeons watching us and the physicians or businesses, what, where can we get this Crytica?

Lloyd Mahaffey

Best thing to do is go to cryticasecurity.com and I will tell you, this is not just a US problem. You're gonna get hit into South America. You're gonna get hit in. Malware is becoming a nation state and at a very sophisticated enterprise, criminal enterprise program around the world. So anywhere there's money, anywhere they can charge big money to ransom images back, you're high risk.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Thank you very much for sharing that with us.

Lloyd Mahaffey

cryticasecurity.com, C R Y T I C A.

Dr. Grant Stevens

This may be the most important technology of beauty piece we have here at the ABAM, so thank you very much for joining us. Thank you.

Hello everyone. I'm Dr. Grant Stevens and I'm here in beautiful Park City, Utah, home of the American Brazilian Aesthetic Medicine Conference where we're here with Renado salts and the whole international. We're filming here at the Technology Beauty and I have the opportunity to interview Sue Dykema, the Executive Director of The Aesthetic Society, or ASAPS, or the American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery.

Sue Dykema

Thank you very much, Dr. Stevens. It's wonderful to be back again.

Dr. Grant Stevens

It's great to have you, Sue. Thank you. So I understand our meeting is coming up April 19th of the 23rd in lovely Miami, Florida. Tell us about it.

Sue Dykema

Yeah, Miami Beach. Everybody needs to come. We've got a great meeting planned covering the whole scope of aesthetic plastic surgery.

So come you get three days all inclusive, Friday, Saturday, Sunday for one fee. Customize your education based on what you wanna learn. And then the value add is you have an opportunity to bring your staff. There is an additional fee for the staff, but we have a whole educational track for your nurses, your practice managers, and we're trying to set up the Aesthetic Society meeting as the meeting for your entire team.

Dr. Grant Stevens

It's always been the meeting in my opinion. Now I can bring my staff and they'll learn more about injecting and other non-surgical skills.

Sue Dykema

Absolutely, practice management. They can have access to the scientific sessions as well on those three days. And if they want to do something like the nurse injectors cadaver lab that is on Thursday, there's an additional fee. But that's a great anatomy of the face and lab that's designed for nurse injectors.

Dr. Grant Stevens

That's excellent. And tell us about hot topics. Always one of the most popular parts of the annual meeting. That's going to be Thursday.

Sue Dykema

That's gonna be Thursday afternoon. And it, there is an additional fee for that, but that is the latest in technology, what's coming, what you need to know for the future. So that's true. Always a very popular session.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Absolutely. Simeon and Tiffany and the group put together an amazing meeting. The hot topics is crazy. It happens to also be the day after the Aesthetic Innovation Summit. AIS, so you can come on Wednesday, watch AIS, and then go right into hot topics in the cadaver lab and then the three Day Aesthetic Society meeting.

Sue Dykema

That's right. And we have some great social events planned as well, so it'll be a great meeting.

Dr. Grant Stevens

You always do. You always have great, good parties? Parties, great parties. Yes. I definitely remember our parties. How about registration? How does the person register?

Sue Dykema

You can go to the website, the aesthetic society.org, and you just follow the links in the medical education section and you can register there. If you register by March one, you get the early bird rate, and after that the prices go up a little bit.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Okay, so you heard it right here at the Technology of Beauty at ABAM Register before March 1st. Save a bunch of money. Come to hot topics. You might also come to AIS, the Aesthetic Innovation Summit, and then of course, stay for the Aesthetic Society Meeting the 20th through the 23rd in Miami. Thank you.

Okay. Thank you for joining us. Thank you. Hello everyone. Dr. Grant Stevens here in Beautiful Park City, Utah, home of the American Brazilian Aesthetic Medicine meeting orABAM and with us this morning is the future president of Aesthetic Society, Kiya Movassaghi from Eugene, Oregon. Welcome Kiya.

Dr. Kiya Movassaghi

Thank you for inviting me back for another episode of the technology.

Dr. Grant Stevens

I was gonna say that this is his second appearance on the technology of beauty here at ABAM. And last time you may recall, he came in after running and training for the Ironman. He's doing it again, but he's going this afternoon. I was able to drag him out of the meeting. Everybody wants to talk to Kiya. So Kiya, welcome. First, tell me what's going on.

Dr. Kiya Movassaghi

Thank you again for inviting me. It's been an exciting time. It is in my life. I think, great news is, I'm an empty nester now. I, my wife always says, don't, stop saying that, but I'm enjoying it. So I see the kids what I want, but I don't have to see 'em all the time.

But on a happy note I am soon to be president-elect of the Aesthetic Society. If the members honor bring me that position. And then I'm just very busy with a lot of things going on. The practice is very well going, very well, but at the same time, I'm doing a lot of things at the, on the leadership side both nationally and internationally to further the cause of aesthetic surgery and medicine.

Dr. Grant Stevens

And I know you're very active in the aesthetic Surgery Society fellowship program. Could you tell us a little bit about that? Where you're gonna take that fellowship training program.

Dr. Kiya Movassaghi

One of the Benefits of being a member of the society and also being a young surgeon, you have access to this, what the, what we call endorse aesthetic fellowships. And you are one of the pioneers actually in aesthetic fellowships and we have a lot of programs now. We have 46 spots now. When I joined seven years ago, we had 17 spots.

So we are happy that we've grown this program, but what we've been noticing also some feedback is that maybe the program's not quite up to standard of what we expect from an aesthetic fellowship. So we are now have developed a task force that we're gonna go back and create some criteria that we are gonna rigidly look at these programs. For instance, for the residency programs at the resident level, we have what's called the residency review committee, RRC, that looks at these programs on an annual basis.

We gotta develop the same thing, what we call fellowship review committee FRC. So we're gonna be looking at these programs every year, and if programs are up to standard, they'll be continued. If they're not, then may be discontinued. So that's one thing that we're working on with a good group of colleagues who are very invested in education of aesthetic surgery. So we're working on that very actively.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Since our underlying core principles of the Aesthetic Society is patient safety, that is obviously the most important thing we can do with our training of our fellows and our residents. So that's fantastic. Now, what about the, what's going on here? We see aesthetic surgery, aesthetic medicine, especially exploding.

You see these med spas everywhere. We see, we read the numbers. Aesthetic medical surgery services is exploding. What are we doing to ensure maximal patient safety? And the good results. But safety first.

Dr. Kiya Movassaghi

Excellent question. I, if you look at our bylaws, and if you look at the, our mission statement, it says, we are in this business aesthetic society is in this business of educating safety of aesthetic surgery and medicine.

And also our job is that to do it good, do a good job with our education for all medical professions who are involved with this space. Go back 10 years ago, space was very limited. It was essentially us and maybe a group of other colleagues with what we call core specialists where we're doing this, but the market is growing and expanding.

And our job is, to make sure that as this market is expanding, we do not lose track of the safety because face is the utmost of interest for all of us involved. So how do we maintain that without losing the exclusivity of surgery for us who are well trained, board certified plastic surgeon.

So that's where the, that's gonna be the challenge and also the opportunity for us to grow and maintain the safety component for all people involved. I'm actually right now we're gonna be chairing a task force.

Looking at this, how are we gonna move forward into the future? You think of it as a sort of a aesthetic pyramid concept where we'll be at the top with the surgery, but there're gonna be tiers of people below us who are not surgeons, but they're still providers of aesthetic medicine. And we have to make sure that these folks are well trained and provide safety to our patients.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Clearly that's the key. Do you already have the answer to how you're going to be doing that? I understand the pyramid. How are we gonna do that with courses, with education cadaver labs? What are, what do you think we're going to do to ensure that safety on those other providers that are maybe extenders or PAs, NPs, RNs?

We don't want this to fall into the hairdressers and manicures, like in China. And that's, against hairdressers, or manicures. But that's not appropriate.

Dr. Kiya Movassaghi

That's the challenge. That's what we, so we have developed this task force that we have. Good mind on the task force and we'll be looking at this challenge and we are gonna put our collective mind into it and see how would be the best way to go forward.

It might have to be a stepwise fashion. Take a baby steps first and do a pilot study and see how that goes. And then try to perfect it and then expand that and maybe become I, the way I envision it let's say 10 years from now, what that in our society will have tiers of me. You are aesthetic surgeon as a member, that you have a nurse practitioner as a member.

And each member at that specific tier will be able to access certain level of education, but not all educations. So I'm thinking maybe in the future that will be the model. I'm not sure, but we'll see how that this goes.

Dr. Grant Stevens

That would be very interesting. Speaking of the society, we have a big meeting coming up. Where and when?

Dr. Kiya Movassaghi

It's gonna be Miami in April, in Miami. It's gonna be exciting. We are expecting that now that we see the covid in our back mirror, hopefully we see a lot of international colleagues join us, especially the South Americans coming in. So we're excited that the, from what I'm hearing from our executive director who is here with us, is the numbers are ahead of the schedule.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Yes. So that's April 19th through the 23rd in Miami. You can register now and we had Sue Dykema, our executive director on the show last night, and I encourage everyone to sign up and of course, on that first day is the Aesthetic Innovation Summit or ais on the 19th, and you'll be. And all of you can register for that also followed by my favorite hot topics.

Yes, indeed. On the 20th, which is always so exciting. So I hope you all register for that. It's a separate registration for hot topics. I'm sure you'll be so busy. As the incoming president-elect, I'll probably not be able to spend much time with you, but I certainly enjoy it. What else would you like to share with any of your adoring fans here today before I send you to your next meeting?

Dr. Kiya Movassaghi

I think, the biggest challenge as you notice if we all get busier and as a, as plastic surgeons, is this is in our dna. We want to always be involved with type A personalities, but my advice to my colleagues is to maintain a work-life balance. Work is good, my life is more important.

And don't let go of your life and focus whatever it that turns you on, what whatever excites you, stay engaged. Stay your engaged with your social friends and exercise and stay healthy. Cuz we only get one health at one soul.

Dr. Grant Stevens

That's right. I want to thank you again for joining me. I hope I see you up on the slopes today, but it sounds like you're gonna be running to get ready for his Ironman competition. What a stud. Go Ducks.

Dr. Kiya Movassaghi

Go Ducks.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Hello everyone. I'm Dr. Grant Stevens. And I'm here in Beautiful Park City, Utah, home of the American Brazilian Aesthetic Medicine meeting, and with us today on I'm a Technology of Beauty podcast is the president of the International Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery. Dr. Lina Triana from Cali, Colombia.

She is my dear friend and in fact is in a group that we formed 10 years ago called Team No Delta, but most importantly, she's the president of the largest aesthetic surgery in medicine group in the world. Thank you very much, Lina for joining me. I appreciate it so much.

Dr. Lina Triana

Thank you for that nice intro. And thank you for being my friend.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Oh, you're very welcome. And we've been together around the world and you've been teaching plastic surgeons like myself and others all over the world. I think of the cruises, I think of Istanbul, I think of Brazil, Argentina, all over the world. Japan for the ISAPS. You have a big meeting coming up. Can you tell us about it?

Dr. Lina Triana

Of course. In the international society, we usually had the meetings every two years, and now we move to a format every. So this year will be in Athens for the first time, a yearly meeting, and then the big meeting in Colombia, Cartagena. I always say it's a beautiful city. You, it's a must come.

You'll have the Latin flavor. The salsa, which I love. Beautiful, how you say, walls, a colonial city with the walls and of the scientific sessions that, as ISAPS, we are leaders in aesthetics and there will be the best static plastic surgery and medicine doctors in that meeting.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Yes. And what's the date of that? Let's do both. What's the date for the upcoming meeting in Athens? Do you recall the date for that?

Dr. Lina Triana

It's 31st of August and 1, 2 and 3 of September. So it's the beginning of September.

Dr. Grant Stevens

And they can register online, correct?

Dr. Lina Triana

Yeah. And it's very important that we know that for having a discounted fee, it's the due date is March 15th. So make sure and register right now.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Okay. And do we have the dates set for the Columbia meeting? Do you know that?

Dr. Lina Triana

We don't have the exact dates, but it will be the week of June 10 to June 16th, 2024. Very important.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Yeah, so we'll first come here for ABAM in '24. And then we'll do you said, did you say March?

Dr. Lina Triana

No, it's June.

Dr. Grant Stevens

June. So then we'll do the Aesthetic Society and then we'll come to Columbia. And we'll all salsa together. We'll have fun. Absolutely. So tell us a little bit about your practice.

Dr. Lina Triana

I do a private practice in Columbia. Was lucky enough to be part of a big group as the aesthetic plastic surgery aesthetic Plastic surgery center that my father. Unfortunately he passed away. There will be two years this march because of Covid. So I grew there in the surgery center. I always like to say that I was quite a little bit shy person when I was little.

My kids say, mom, you were not shy. I say, yeah, I was. I was very shy. And so I listened a lot and when I joined my father's practice and these other three doctors that were at the surgery center, what I did was listening to the patients, they were very, So I was following up with the patients and listening to them.

And that's how I discovered. And you say what she's telling me. You told me what's about my practice? What come, what's so come? And then when I was there listening to the patients, I start discovering that a lot of these patients that were in the surgery center, that were successful women with successful I say jobs, professions, family, they didn't feel complete when they were, when we were speaking about their sex lives.

And that may be because I was a woman and I was young and I had all the time, and I loved to listen. And they opened to me and then I said, you know what? I'm gonna search what's in the aesthetic world regarding the genital and the vagina. And guess what? I looked into the matters in a high book.

And there was just one single paragraph of labiaplasty, that was all about it. Nothing else. That cannot be true. So I started to search for opportunities and see where I could learn more about. How to really better serve this patient. And that's why I got in love, I can say with the vagina aesthetics and that I do today.

I always say that I don't want you to just to be the vagina doctor. No. Because I do love variety, how I say lots of things to do in my practice and just don't, one little thing. But of course, I think that's one of the ways I started growing in the scientific world. Because I truly believe that I, that they needed to change, not just one paragraph.

So I started writing and learning and giving my experience. And I can say that today, I'm very happy to say that in any static plastic surgery meeting, there's always a session of something regarding. Aesthetics, genital aesthetics are vagina aesthetics. And before that there wasn't. So I think we are serving these patients to make patients, to make this woman complete, 20 times we feel we are leaders.

And that's something that I want to bring to ISAPS and we're working towards that. It's an say, like a little peeky piece from the future that we are creating in ISAPS, because we can say that as ISAPS, we are leaders in aesthetics. And many times we believe ourselves as leaders, as surgeons.

We have a big ego and we are leaders we lead, and of course, as doctors, we lead in the surgery center. We lead in the, or We lead in our families. So we believe we're leaders, but to be a true leader, guess what? You need to be complete in every aspect of your life. And if you see a lot of these successful plastic surgeons or aesthetic doctors, they're so successful maybe in their practice, maybe with the money, but what about the family?

What about who they are? What about their hobbies? Are they really complete? That's a big question that each and everyone has to ask to ourselves. And as ISAPS being all there for aesthetic education. Part of and serving for and serving our patients for patient safety. Part of it is that this surgeons, these doctors that serve the patients, feel themselves as a complete person that will be successful.

That will be true leaders, and that's what we are here for.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Excellent. I couldn't have said any better. I completely agree with you. It's such a pleasure to have you on the show, and we've spent so much quality time together, and I want everyone to know that she's truly a world's expert. She has expanded the whole vaginal surgical and nonsurgical treatments in ways that no one has, and she's a world expert on not just labioplasty, but rhinoplasty and all the various other nonsurgical and surgical. You've done a wonderful job and there's not a panel that doesn't have you on it when we talk about labioplasty and so forth. So I look forward to spending more time with you, Lina.

Dr. Lina Triana

Me too. Me too. And that's, let's remember all of what we did in, in Team No Delta. That's another story that we can share.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Team No Delta. We're in a, we're in a team, with Kiya who is on the program. Kiya. And a number of others. So it's been a great ride and thank you for everything you've done for me and everything you mean to me. I appreciate it.

Dr. Lina Triana

No, thank you again, Grant and he's an innovator, you're an, and as innovators, when we want something to change, many times change. People are like, should we do change? Should we not do change? But we need people like you that have the courage to really create that new future. And that's Grant Stevens. Thank you very much.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Thank you. You take care.

Hello everyone. I'm Dr. Grant Stevens. I'm here in Beautiful Park City, Utah, home of ABAM, the American Brazilian Aesthetic Medicine meeting, and I was able to snag a special guest here, Tim Papadopoulos, a dear friend, a plastic surgeon in Sydney, Australia.

An officer, a board member of the International Society. Tim, welcome to the Technology Beauty. Thanks for sharing some time with us here. Before you go skiing or to all your other board meetings and so forth, tell us a little bit about yourself, your practice, and so forth.

Dr. Tim Papadopoulos

Thank you very much. First of all, Granto for having me. And it's a real special honor to be here at the 15th anniversary of ABAM. I'm a plastic surgeon in Sydney, as you say. I run three clinics. I mainly specialize in breast body contouring, but of late being a facial anatomist. I've been doing a lot more of facelifts, neck lifts, which I really love. And It was part of my talk just yesterday.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Yeah, just yesterday talking about, you called it the one that I came from a fish.

Dr. Tim Papadopoulos

Yeah, that's right. It was lots of fun to share what I've learnt with the audience and I think they appreciated it was a little bit out of the box, but I love that.

Dr. Grant Stevens

It was a lot of fun. Very edgy as always. It's good. If I'm not mistaken, you're also heading up the Aesthetic Society Cruise. Is that correct?

Dr. Tim Papadopoulos

Yeah, what an honor that is.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Tell us about it.

Dr. Tim Papadopoulos

It's gonna be in the Mediterranean next year, and it's a wonderful event. I also have the co-chair Kristi Hustak, and she's gonna be great. And so we're just planning, trying to make it the best ever and it's gonna be lots of fun. Really invite everybody to come to her cuz it's gonna be a great event. It's the thing that I love about the cruise, it's a one-on-one and everyone's so relaxed and you can talk to the best in their field. It's just an amazing sort of situation to be in.

Dr. Grant Stevens

They are unbelievable. It's how we get to know one another. They're very easiest for the very best with. Yeah, no doubt. I love that. Now, how, what about the upcoming meetings for isop? I know we've gone from every two years to every one year. We have a meeting coming up in Athens, correct?

Dr. Tim Papadopoulos

Yeah, the Olympiad. And that's gonna be Grace. And I invite all our plastic surgical colleagues to that because it's a wonderful event where we're going to have a little bit of competition between the continents and trying to get the the best presentation. And there's lots of other little things that I won't talk about now cuz I want to be a bit of a surprise. But that's gonna be fun. And then we've got the ISAPS meeting in 2024. And that should also be great.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Great. Excellent. What else would you like to share with your adoring fans?

Dr. Tim Papadopoulos

I dunno that I got many adoring great fans. I just wanted to say to people, get engaged with these meetings because they're a wonderful opportunity to meet people from overseas, international sort of colleagues where you form these very special bonds.

We've got a very special bond. Absolutely. That's been going for many years. And that's what I love about these meetings, that you get to meet people from different cultures, different ethnic. And the funny thing is we all have that same DNA in all of us, and that's what I love.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Absolutely. Once again, thank you. I'm gonna let you go back to the program. Thanks for sharing this time with us and I'll see you on the slopes.

Dr. Tim Papadopoulos

As always.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Hello everyone. Dr. Grant, Stevens here from Beautiful Park City, Utah, home of ABAM, the American Brazilian Aesthetic Medicine. And with us today is Behnam Analui, the COO of Yes Doctor.

I was able to steal him out off the floor and come here. This is his second time at ABAM and this is, as our 15th anniversary of ABAM. Welcome. How are you doing Behnam?

Behnam Analui

Dr. Stevens, thank you so much for having me on this. It's so my pleasure. So wonderful to be back at ABAM. Last year when we were here, it was our first time we got a chance to talk to Renato and a lot of the plastic surgeons, is exclusive meeting to be able to talk to them and about our new company. At the time, we hadn't even launched yet. We were just a few people and it's great to be back to give you an update of where we are, what we are doing.

Dr. Grant Stevens

I can't wait to hear. I remember when you were here last year. It's when I first met you and heard about this amazing technology with Yes Doctor, why don't you briefly tell us what it is and then tell us how you've done in the last year. Cuz I've already heard about your successes. Let everybody know just what is Yes Doctor.

Behnam Analui

Absolutely. Thank you. So we have built what is called a new term. It's a health FinTech. So we are building a technology infrastructure platform company. It's a primarily patient acquisition platform, but one of the key differentiations or new things that we are bringing to this space is with a technology heavy team, we are trying to build a product that supports the full journey of patients.

From the time that maybe they're thinking, looking into the mirror of what are the options that I might have to address this concern. And they go to Google and search for what are the solutions for this? That's where we get in front of them and we bring them and engage with them through their journey.

And one of the key components that we have added to this platform is financing. So we call it patient acquisition with embedded financing. We know one of the key questions on top of every patients in this space as they start their journey is, how do I pay for it? Sure. And and we like to really upfront at the beginning of their journey, put them at ease that, you have this suspending power and really show them the multiple options they might have.

If the, if they want to go and find, a top qualified plastic surgeon that, they have the money in their pocket, we empower them with that information upfront, and then we engage them throughout their journey. The second thing that we've done, and that's why we are here at ABAM, is we really wanna work with only top board certified plastic surgeons that we can find them here in ABAM or aesthetic societies, ASAPS, that we usually go to.

And as a result, we are trying to build a platform that at the end of the day creates affordable solutions with quality care to these patient.

Dr. Grant Stevens

So you acquire the patients for the surgeons, do you also provide the financing?

Behnam Analui

We don't directly provide the financing. So the way we are building the platform is we believe there has been financing solutions before and there are new companies such as PatientFi, Cherry, we're coming to the table and they're actually bringing these options to the patients.

So what we are building is we are trying to be an aggregator in terms of financing solutions, okay? And enable any potential investor who wants to, participate in providing financing in this space to bring that option. We believe this is going to create a situation in which practices will benefit.

Because it'll balance out the cost of financing to the practices. As typically for any financing, there are some fees that practices are charged. Sure. And at the same time, we also think that this will bring new players to the financing in this space, which will Which is a great space, by the way, from a lender's perspective.

And the reason is patients and consumers who come to this space, they're doing something luxury. They wanna look better, they want to they're doing an elective treatment. They're typically somebody who are able to pay. They have some dispensable income. So they are a great portfolio of consumers from a lender's perspective to lend.

So we wanna open up that space and the way Tim is gonna talk about it in this ABAM is gonna present tomorrow our solution for multi lender aggregation, working with all of the current players as well as maybe bringing new players and enable financing to many patients and open it up.

Dr. Grant Stevens

That's fantastic. And how have you done since the last ABAM, and here we are a year later. How has the company been doing?

Behnam Analui

Excellent question. Last event we hadn't even launched yet, so we were busy building the product and, trying to brand ourselves and showing, what we are doing to many of the, great practices in this space.

Since then, we launched in October, our sales focused in Texas, and we are doing extremely well in terms of patient acquisition. One of the things that's happening is we have built a team that, similar to what a practice will happen in a broader sense. A team that actually touchpoints with patients from the beginning of their journey when we pre-qual them pre-qualified 'em for financing.

And patients love it because, we ask them few very simple questions when they come to our funnels, we ask them what? What is your concern? Do you have a budget? When do you want to do this treatment? With a few simple questions. We are immediately able to match them with some of the plastic, top plastic surgeons that we already have in our platform.

And because of that, really since October, we have doubled their acquisition volume. Month over month. Whoa. In February, we are already beating the whole month of January. And financing is at earlier stage. We have currently two or three different lenders that we work with.

And because surgeries are booked, maybe two, three months in advance, we haven't really, we are seeing a growth in our lending volume, but not as much as we see in patient acquisition because people come in, they love to go to these consultations and then get something. We are working with a lot of young, early to mid carrier surgeons that doing amazing job.

But, they need some help from us to do their marketing, to go out and talk about them and brand them and and the patients see their work and they say, I wanna see this doctor. I wanna go to this doctor. How can I afford it? And we say, yes, you're ready to go. We book them.

Dr. Grant Stevens

That's fantastic. What a great way of helping, especially the young and middle market surgeons. Do the surgeons pay you a monthly fee for marketing or is it all built into the financing fees?

Behnam Analui

No, we don't have any upfront fees to the surgeons. We love to have, surgeons who like to work with us. We love to feature them. We bring them on board, we invest in marketing advertisement and listing those patients and the practices as well as their, if they have any me spat treatments all for free. And we do upfront investment ourselves, the platform does, and the only fee that we charge is when we actually sit a patient on the surgeon's consultation chair. And then at the end, if the patient chooses to use a financing that comes from our platform, then there will be financing fees involved. But there is no upfront fee that we charge the practice.

Dr. Grant Stevens

It's really nice you're carving the risk out of this for especially the younger surgeons and so forth. That's a fantastic opportunity for them.

Behnam Analui

Absolutely. So right now what we, that's what we've seen also, the most successful stories that we have are with younger surgeons who are just building their, maybe the first five years of building their practice, they have obviously other means of marketing and showcasing their work, but we are just an augmented way to help them out.

And because we have multiple channels of finding patients and a flow of patients. These are typically as I said, pre-qualified. So they have spending power, but also some pre-screened and most importantly, high intent patients. So these are the ones who are ready to book a consult. They just, they know exactly what they want and they know what the look that they want, and we know, the two surgeons that can give it to them. So it's a match made in heaven.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Good. Thank you Behnam, and thank you for bringing us Yes Doctor. It is long overdue, patient acquisition and financing built into one business. There you have it. Yes Doctor, check it out. And thanks for supporting ABAM two years in a row. I hope you'll be here next year also. I bet you will be.

Behnam Analui

Absolutely. We would love to be back here. We love this area. It's very, we love Park City skiing, but more than that, we love the surgeons who are here and we like to showcase our work.

Dr. Grant Stevens

Fantastic. I look forward to seeing you.