Quiz: Cosmetic Surgery Myths and Facts

The average age of someone who has cosmetic surgery is 41. Younger people tend to have nose reshaping, known as rhinoplasty, breast enhancement, and liposuction. Older people have more facelifts, breast lifts, and eyelid surgery.

Breast enhancement is the most common cosmetic surgery among women. Other popular cosmetic surgeries in women include liposuction, breast reduction, tummy tuck, and cosmetic eyelid surgery.

Breast implants don't last forever. Women who get them are likely to need more surgeries to repair implant ruptures and take care of other complications, like breast pain, the FDA says. They may also decide they want adjustments of size, corrections of wrinkling or rippling, etc.

Implants can hide some breast tissue from X-rays, making it harder to test for breast cancer. If you have implants, keep getting mammograms. Tell the people doing the test that you have them, and make sure the testers have experience doing mammograms on women with implants. 

They may need to do your test a different way, pushing the implant back against the chest and pulling breast tissue forward for a better view.

Liposuction is the most common cosmetic surgery procedure performed on men. Other popular cosmetic surgeries for men include nose reshaping, cosmetic eyelid surgery, male breast reduction, and cosmetic ear surgery.

Men had more than one million cosmetic procedures done in 2017. That’s about 8% of all cosmetic surgeries (compared to almost 15 million for women).

No special approval (the official term is "board certification") is required to perform cosmetic surgery in the United States. But it’s a good thing to look for in a surgeon. Make sure your surgeon is certified by the American Board of Plastic Surgery.

Many cosmetic surgery procedures can be done without you being admitted to the hospital. Occasionally, the surgeon may suggest an overnight stay. Patients should not stay alone for the first day or two after surgery.

It tends to take longer to recover from cosmetic surgery procedures on the lower body. Recovery times are measured in weeks for thigh lifts (2 to 4 weeks) and lower body lifts (4 to 6 weeks). Lower body lifts -- intended to tighten loose, sagging skin in the buttocks, hips, and thighs -- can take up to eight hours to perform and are one of the most expensive cosmetic surgeries.

Body dysmorphic disorder is a mental condition in which people can't stop worrying about minor or imagined physical flaws. Cosmetic surgery can be a problem,  because they are likely to be unhappy with the results and seek additional operations. Patients said to be addicted to cosmetic surgery are often suffering from body dysmorphic disorder.