Dr. Randal Haworth is a world-renowned Plastic Surgeon, who has been in Beverly Hills private practice since 1995. Not only is plastic surgery his passion, but he is an exhibited artist, inventor, entrepreneur, and a TV personality. While one might expect a man, who might be aloof and eager to show his laurels, Dr. Haworth is essentially a down-to-earth man, pensive and self-critical. Call him an all-rounded type of guy, but a true renaissance man is a more apt description.
First of all, he invented and patented a revolutionary anesthesia device he has called the JawThruster. One of its uses is in deep IV sedation. This type of anesthesia can be dangerous because the patient may occlude their airway and stop breathing (think of the sad case of Michael Jackson); but with the JawThruster™ patients can stay safe under anesthesia because it supports and elevated the jaw. Dr. Mahajan, the department Chair of Anesthesia of the whole UCLA Medical Center is a big supporter and considers the device a “game changer”.
If that weren’t enough, Dr. Haworth is also the creator of NightLift®, which is the world’s first intelligent sleep bra. Based on his patented wire-free B.U.S.T.® (bilateral uplift support technology), it gives women a way to protect the aesthetics of their décolletage without resorting to costly surgery. His initial studies have shown that it even reversed some of the damaging effects of gravity upon the breast.
Dr. Haworth is initially from the west coast, born in Inglewood, a suburb of Los Angeles, but moved to England at the age of 10. There he was enrolled as a boarding student in The King’s School, Canterbury, one of the oldest schools in the world. There he received his primary and secondary school education. From there, he attended the University of California, Santa Cruz, which he described as a culture shock- a veritable contrast to the ultra-conservative doctrine of his English education. He majored in Biology, Chemistry and minored in Art History, where he graduated with honors.
Next, Dr. Haworth completed his MD from USC, where he earned, Junior Alpha Omega Alpha (AOA)the highest medical school. He then Chief Resident after completing five years of a residency in General Surgery at the New York Hospital, Cornell University, in 1993. In conjunction with his residency, he also received specialized training at the world-famous Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, in New York City.
Returning to California, he undertook a final fellowship in plastic surgery at the UCLA Medical Center. Dr. Haworth’s training included all aspects of plastic surgery, which is surprisingly diverse. This included pediatrics (cleft lips, craniofacial deformities, etc., hand surgery, trauma and cancer reconstruction in addition to cosmetics. As one of his mentors said: “plastic surgery is surgery of the human skin and all of its contents.” While at UCLA, he was named Plastic Surgery Consultant of the Year in 1993-94 as well as winning first place in the UCLA plastic surgery research prize.
From there, with a negative balance on his credit card, he opened his practice in 1995 and was named one of the Top 8 plastic surgeons in Los Angeles by LA Magazine. Dr. Randal Haworth was also listed as one of the top 2 plastic surgeons by LA Confidential Magazine and has been listed twice by W Magazine as being one of the top 8 plastic surgeons in the United States. Dr. Haworth has made several television appearances, including ‘Dr. Phil’, ‘Larry King Live’, the Fox Television hit series ‘The Swan,’ and several others. Dr. Haworth has also appeared in a number of publications, including Cosmo, People, Vogue, and many others.
When he isn’t creating perfection in the surgical field, Dr. Haworth is also an artist, having exhibited in a number of galleries in Los Angeles and Florida. His initial body of work explored various elements of photorealism.
Why did you choose to become a plastic surgeon?
I always wanted to be an artist and loved everything about it. However, my parents said that the only way they would keep supporting me financially is if I was matriculated into a medical school because they were adamant in having a doctor in the family. Fraught with both fear and guilt, I felt there was no other choice. However, I was desperate to find a compromise, one which would satisfy my creative side while immersing myself in the medical sciences. It then struck me. I remembered a BBC TV documentary I saw in the UK when I was 14 or so, on plastic surgery. It focused around an eccentric cosmetic plastic surgeon by the name of Kurt Wagner, who roller-skated between clinic rooms with a Mikey Mouse cap during the disco era. Though my character would prevent me from engaging in such outlandish behavior, I nevertheless was inspired by how a surgeon would exhibit such freedom of expression. In retrospect, I probably equated his behavior with a form of performance art. I then came to the conclusion that plastic surgery was the perfect blend of art and science and was the path I needed to take.
What area do you specialize in?
I specialize in hyper-aesthetics, which include eye lifts, lip reshaping, endoscopic brow and cheek lifts, and much more. It’s similar to an orchestra-conductor, who has to know each instrument in the orchestra, even better than the musicians themselves. He needs to herd the individual players, synergizing their sounds into a harmonious form. If only one instrument is out of tune, the whole melodic orchestration will fall apart. The same goes for the plastic surgeon striving for hyperaesthetic change. I need to be intimately familiar with all facial elements and the proper operations to better them-all the while making sure that all plastic surgical changes are in sync with each other.
One specialty I’m particularly passionate about is lip reshaping surgery, one in which I’ve introduced new concepts and techniques. People ask me what lip reshaping exactly is. Just like the breasts, lips sag with age; the upper lip gets longer, the corners of the mouth droop downwards while the lower lip starts to hang exposing the lower teeth. To return the lips to a youthful and vibrant appearance, lifting needs to be performed, not just voluming. Again, this is similar to a strategy when dealing with a sagging breast-a lift should be done before or at the same time as an implant if indicated. Upper lip lifts, variants of corner lip lifts and lower V-Y plasties are among the lip reshaping surgeries available today. They require precise planning and execution and can be performed in any number of combinations to suit the desired result. Even half a millimeter can change everything for the better or, the worse. One such procedure is a modified version of the old “bullhorn” upper lip lift. This latter operation often results in noticeable scarring and nasal distortion with poor longevity and sub-optimal appearance. I developed a significant modification to this lift by securing the superficial muscle to the stable lining up the bone-in effect, transferring attention away from the overlying skin to the deeper structure. I call this the OOS lip lift (OOS stands for Orbicularis Oris Suspension), which results in significantly less nasal distortion and scarring (indeed, nearly imperceptible to the naked eye), far better longevity as well as beauty.
What is your daily routine?
There are two types of days during the week for me. I have days where I do clinical work, which includes new patient consults, fillers, injectables, small surgeries, and post-op check-ups. The other days I perform surgery.
My clinic days begin at 9:00 am. I have breakfast, feed my dog, load my car and drive to work. By the time I arrive between 8:30 and 9:00 am, I immediately start my day, knowing that clinic days are often longer and more draining. Time management is everything, so in the mornings I see my new patients and do follow-ups, and during the afternoon, I perform the non-invasive techniques and small surgeries.
When I have my surgical days, they start at 6:15 am. I have breakfast and head to the surgical center. My patient is already checked in by my nurse at 7:30 am, and I spent a half hour marking them up before surgery. There are days I’m in surgery standing until 8:30 or even 9:00 pm if it is a significant procedure. The smaller procedures may take 2 to 3 hours.
I don’t have lunch at the usual time, like most people. It might be as late as 4:00 pm. During my breaks, I write a lot of content and prepare my Instagram posts. I also take a lot of phone calls and answer my emails during any 2-minute break which comes along. There are many days where I may see patients until 8:00 pm or even 9 PM. Usually, by 10:00 pm, I leave the office and head home, where I may work on my other businesses until 1:00 or maybe 1:30 in the morning. After this, I finally head to bed for the night.
What do you love about your job?
Being able to better the lives of people, not just their physical appearance but their confidence as well.
Indeed, I remember one patient telling me that his chin implant and neck liposuction was worth one year of psychotherapy! As one of the very few surgeons who perform lip reshaping surgery, becoming an authority within this field is immensely gratifying. I love teaching as well, sharing my knowledge and experiences with other surgeons, whether through lectures, apprenticeships or authoring chapters in textbooks.
What would you consider to be the greatest accomplishment in your career?
As others consider me an expert in lip reshaping, I have contributed chapters to textbooks about this field in plastic surgery. Years and years of dedication, passion, and curiosity has afforded me a sense of great pride, especially when I have the time to reflect upon my past. Also, every day is satisfying when my patients’ results come out better the next day than the previous. I always ask questions and am self-critical of my work, always trying to improve things for my patient’s each and every day.
Finally, developing products such as NightLift® and the JawThruster™ have been so rewarding in that I can possibly help to better the lives and increase the safety of others unrelated to the field of plastic surgery.
Tell our readers about some of your volunteer activities.
Back in the day, I was doing surgeries in Guatemala helping children who have cleft lips and cleft palates. It can be frustrating because compared to the States with its sophisticated technology, in underdeveloped countries you may have to wing it and get a bit creative. People don’t realize how we take things for granted. Because in Third World countries they don’t have the technology and the patients along with their families appreciate the work that you do even more.
I also volunteered in Kuwait. There were many people still injured from the Iraq War because Iraq was only 20 miles away. I did paid work too, but it was refreshing to help people change their lives for
the better.
Another person who recently comes to mind is an African American woman who had half of her lip bitten off by another girl while in foster care. Reconstructing her lip was a personal challenge, and her immense gratitude was priceless. Being able to help such an unfortunate woman was one of the best experiences I’ve had in the last decade.
What do you do to mentally separate yourself from your job?
It has been more difficult recently, because of various personal and business-related situations. I used to do a lot of painting and drawing even to the point I had five different gallery shows within the period of a year. Currently, I try to compartmentalize and put problems into drawers and close them. That way they do not leak into my personal life. You should have discipline when it comes to that, and recently I haven’t been able to do that because of the sheer volumes of issues to contend with. I used to exercise every day until a year ago because I just haven’t had time to do that. But I will be resuming that with gusto. I also enjoy making videos for my Instagram page. And, of course, I love traveling; but then again, who doesn’t?