In a world of what’s new, some experts are focused on what’s actually impactful. 

At WWD’s annual L.A. Beauty Forum, senior reporter Ryma Chikhoune sat down with plastic surgeon Dr. Julius Few; Dr. Ellie Byun, acupuncturist and founder and chief executive officer of Mimoh, and registered nurse Vanessa Lee to discuss the convergence of wellness, innovation and aesthetics. With new treatments popping up every day, the trio emphasized the importance of approaching newness with curiosity, opting for personalized services and taking time to get to know patients and their goals. 

To kick off the conversation, Few discussed how he approaches new treatments coming to market, always assessing whether something is impactful rather than jumping on the bandwagon just to have something new. 

“I’m open to look at any and everything, but with a skeptical eye,” Few said. “Good clinical research that actually is placebo controlled for variables and then looks at what is the other alternative treatment…that’s the bar we have to look at.” 

While efficacy of treatment is crucial, the experts agreed that assessing whether or not a patient needs it is just as important. 

“People are just tired of getting an automated standard answer,” Lee said. 

Byun added: “There’s nothing that’s one size fits all for everyone.” 

She further discussed her approach of working with patients, which like Few and Lee starts with getting to know them, their personal pain points and overall wellness goals. 

“The four pillars would be when a patient will come in, for example, I would ask them, ‘How is your digestion? How is your sleeping quality? How is your hormone balancing?’ From that, I  custom make a treatment plan and custom make the formulas that will help.” 

The group discussed why this more customized approach to treatments is not the norm in the industry. 

“It comes back to being able to customize a treatment as deeply as possible, and that takes a lot of time,” said Lee, who uses the concept of “facial balancing” on each patient. “In our industry, that’s not always the most profitable, because we’re based off of volume in aesthetics and cosmetic dermatology. Practitioners are usually pressured to see anywhere from 25 to 40 patients in a day. That’s quick.” 

In terms of what’s next in the industry, Byun emphasized the growth of treatments like salmon DNA, while Few said that GLP-1s and the aesthetic services that come after aren’t going anywhere. That being said, they closed out the conversation by agreeing that the future of aesthetics will come down to highlighting each patient’s natural beauty via a custom plan, rather than going for a homogenous look going forward. 

“What I’m hearing is we’re going to preserve the beauty. This is a room full of beautiful people,” Few said. “It would be a crime to make everybody look the same.”