badreligion Posted April 19, 2016 Share Posted April 19, 2016 Haha good coffee makes everything better! 3-4 mil for incisional and epi. I'm also considering partial incision, just because I won't be staying too long and the recovery time is faster. Did you go to the consultation alone, or with family as well? Also, have you booked your surgery date! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tchu Posted April 19, 2016 Share Posted April 19, 2016 Hello people!! A little bit of update about my experience of double eyelid surgery in Korea on the 14th. I'm now waiting for my transit flight in HK and I have some time to kill. I was reading through this forum as part of my research work and I understand the feeling of you not knowing which place to go! And especially if you don't speak Korean. I'll do my best to share my experience and opinion, if you want more info, my kakao: tchule My flight to Korea was on 14th April, and I was going with another 5 friends, who have decided to engage a medical agent Claire, like docfinder from Beautique Korea. I'm always a little bit skeptical so after my research work, I think the service provided with the aim of 'bargaining for best price' doesn't make any sense. Agent gets paid in commission - that's an obvious conflict of interest. But my friends had already paid for deposit to secure surgery date, so they decided to go with Claire's recommendation, which is Banobagi. Lesson #1 - there's no need to engage medical agent, unless you are too lazy to do your own homework, and has a lot of money to pay. Banobagi is a famous place for foreigners, I'm not saying that the doctor is bad, I'm not saying that the doctor is the best, but you will be paying WAY TOO MUCH. Lesson #2 - don't pay any deposit before seeing the doctor in person. And please, always have more than 1 consultation to have second option. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tchu Posted April 19, 2016 Share Posted April 19, 2016 My friends and I arrived on different dates so we have consulation and surgery on different dates. My objective is to get double eyelid surgery, and because I have keloid scar problem, so I was really hoping for being able to get non-incisional double eyelid procedure done. Before the trip, I was asking for quotation and online consultation with photo. I scheduled appointments with Teuim, Banobagi (because my friends are going there anyway, so I tagged along) and Opera. Fortunately I have a Korean housemate when I was doing my degree, so I asked him for opinion and he referred me a friend who happened to be free and recommended me another clinic, which is obviously not very well known by any of us here on this forum. The clinic consultant do understand English, but they choose not to speak because their English is not very good, so the friend offered to go with me to the clinic for consultation, also acting as a translator. Lesson #3: BIG names or small hospital?? For my case, double eyelid is not really a big deal, so honestly speaking, I'm not looking for the BEST EYE SURGEON in Seoul. As long as the doctor is experienced, that's a good assurance. I was told by my Korean friend, Mr. P, that for hospital/clinic with very big scale, like owning the entire building, part of your surgery cost is meant to pay for rental of building or mortgage, so definitely the price would be higher than smaller size clinic. Secondly, to deal with foreigners they need to hire more Chinese/English speaking coordinator, that's also coming from the surgery price. So big name or big clinic not necessarily equal to good doctor. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tchu Posted April 19, 2016 Share Posted April 19, 2016 So my friends want to do fat grafting / rhinoplasty / PRP. One shocking thing about Banobagi is that, the price quoted can be very different, from one person to another, even both are foreigners. Banobagi has forgotten that the 5 of us went at different timing, but we were from the same group. For example, for PRP, it was quoted at 2m KRW to one friend, and quoted 1.1m KRW to another friend. And from the local/less well known clinic I went with Mr. P, it was quoted 800k KRW. I was quoted 3.52m KRW for non-incisional double eyelid + ptosis correction at banobagi. And the small clinic I went to quoted 2.5m KRW. I can't remember all the prices quoted by banobagi to my friends, but comparing the price to small clinic, that difference is HUGE! **sorry folks, need to board the plane now. To be continued when I'm back home** Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
badreligion Posted April 19, 2016 Share Posted April 19, 2016 Could you do a review for the clinics you've visited? I'm quite interested in all the big three you've visited, and would love to hear your opinion on them. Also, if you did your surgery with the smaller clinic, how were the results? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
missnewface Posted April 20, 2016 Share Posted April 20, 2016 Hey sunflower, So I went to my consultation, and honestly it was really good! The endoscopic browlift is legit. Only thing is that it costs 5.5 mil, where it's the same cost in Canada (and they do a perfect job here) so Yea I can't afford it at this time because I'm doing other surgeries Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tchu Posted April 20, 2016 Share Posted April 20, 2016 hi BadReligion, I didn't have time to go to Teuim. Consultation arranged at 2.30pm at Banobagi with Dr Lee, 3.30pm at Teuim, and 5pm at the small clinic. It was already 3.30pm when I got there at Banobagi because of the scary crowd at the immigration checkpoint. I landed at 12.30pm and head straight to Banobagi. Banobagi: We all need to go through a consultant before seeing the real Dr. Consultant suggested cutting of outer eye corner, if I want to make my eyes bigger. She said that Non-Incision is possible for me. So finally when we meet the doctor, he was telling me non incisional method too, but to make my eyes looks bigger he suggested ptosis correction. No cutting of eye corners needed. I feel comfortable with this doctor and there's a sense of confidence in what he is doing. After seeing doctor, then we go back to see the consultant again to talk about the price. She wrote two numbers on the paper, 3.52m KRW ~ 4.29m KRW. I'm in the sales line and I do know how sales pitching sounds like but quoting two numbers and saying, 'yes, because you are with claire, we will give you the lowest price', which is 3.52m. And then of course, I asked for discount based on the reason that my two friends already did the surgery on the same day. She reduced the price to 2.88m KRW. I asked again, it was 2.75m KRW, the lowest she said she can give. Price quoted here is excluding the 10% tax, but it's refundable at the airport. At banobagi, either paying in cash or credit card is the same. p/s: based on my research work, on taiwanese/chinese forum, the price quoted is still way above the average price. And i wanted 2nd opinion before i made decision so i said that i'll consider about it. And i left for my second consultation. Teuim: I decided NOT to go to Teuim for consultation as i was short of time. However, I would like to share a few things about Teuim, based on my own experience and my friend's experience who got hers done there last year. Teuim was shortlisted because my friend got her eyes done there last year. She told me that he is one of the top eye surgeon in the country. Before fixing appointment date, i did email different clinics for online consultation. Out of 6 clinics I emailed, Teuim was the only clinic telling me that i'm not a suitable candidate for non incisional method, and epi is recommended. The other 5 clinics, none of them say i need incisional/partial incisional or suggested epi. This is the first thing that made me decided that 'it is okay to drop Teuim out of the list', when i was really out of time. I must say that the result of my friend is really nice and natural, not saying that Teuim is bad or not good. But for my case, I don't think the doctor's style matches my preference. My friend said Dr Kwon would suggest epi to almost all of his patient, and would not operate if you reject the epi. I didn't have any chance to verify this fact, but this is what i heard. So, second point, it's okay not going to Teuim. I was quoted incisional method/ptosis: 2.5m ~ 3m KRW & epi 1.4m KRW over email. I heard that they prefer payment in cash if you want more discount. Small clinic: Went to this clinic as it was recommended by a KOREAN, and to find out myself how is it different from those big hospital. This small clinic is in apgujeong area, located on 6th floor of a building. It's not a big one, it's sharing the floor with some other clinic. The conversation with the consultant was only in Korean, and my friend was there translating. He asked if I want to let them know that I went to Banobagi, I said no. Non incisional method was recommended. She said that my eyelid is quite thin, and i'm below age 30, non incisional would be good. She mentioned that my eyes distance are just nice, so doing epi would make them too close. She also suggested ptosis correction. Not suggesting a crease that is too high, because between my brow and my eyes the distance is not too big either. I asked about canthoplasty, but she said it's better to speak to doctor. When I met the doctor, he speaks English, but not that kind of super fluent one, but it's good enough to communicate. He suggested non incisional + ptosis correction, plus a minor fat cells removal. My eyelids are thin enough for non-incisional method but there's a bit of puffiness. So if remove a bit of fat cells the crease will appear to be more natural. He explained to me very thoroughly about ptosis correction, and he suggested giving me a botox injection on my forehead, to correct the bad habit of using forehead muscles over the recovery period. THAT IS SOMETHING UNHEARD OF TO ME. He explained that, due to the weak eye muscles, I tend to use my forehead muscles or brow muscles when i'm doing my facial expression, that leads to forehead wrinkles and wrinkles between eyebrows. With botox injection after the surgery, I will get used to not using those muscles anymore and will help my eyes getting used to the eyes muscles, it's more for helping the correction of bad habit, or to help a bit on recovery by strengthening my eyes muscles. He said that if I accept his proposal, he is giving me the botox injection for free. Then he left and the consultant came in, to discuss about the price. It was quoted at 2.2m ~ 2.5m KRW. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tchu Posted April 20, 2016 Share Posted April 20, 2016 And about my surgery outcome, i don't know how to post a picture here. But do feel free to kakao me: tchule I'm more than willing to share my recovery process. I did my surgery on 14th and it took 30 mins. I have been drinking soju+beer and eating seafood, walking around a lot and not putting enough coolpacks on my eyes when i was in seoul, so I think the recovery is a little bit slow. But i can't tell for sure. I will try my best to find way to post a picture here. A bit more on the experience over the 30 mins surgery on Thursday: it's almost painless. I'm really not exaggerating, the most painful part was when they put the IV drip on my hand. I could hear my heartbeat, and I was really nervous as I was told by my friend who went to Teuim that it was very painful, especially when she was doing epi. The doctor asked me to relax and to breathe in deeply, soon i drifted into my dream and start seeing a lot of bright neon colours! Quite interesting experience i must say. But i could still hear doctor telling me to open and close my eyes once in a while, seeing doctor and hearing his voice is assuring as I have been warned about ghost doctor. I could feel it when he is done with one eyes and moved to another eyes, wiping off my tears or something, a bit of pulling and tugging. But not pain. When it's finally over, it's the feeling of heaviness on eyelid, as if you've been crying for 2 days non stop. Stitches to be removed on Monday. Even stitches removal was painless too. I really don't think that i'm the one with very high tolerance for pain, but it was so quick and the only thing i noticed was the snapping sound coming from metal, two times. That's it. You would probably wonder now if i'm advertising for the clinic or what. I'm one girl, who wanted to get double eyelid surgery done, and had gone through the toughest process, which is the research part. And with my experience, I really hope that we can help each other, by giving insight of surgery process, and helping each other from getting rip off by clinic, doesn't make sense to pay more just because we are foreigner. xxxxx Free service from DocFinder just doesn't make any sense. He is ashamed of how much banobagi is charging comparing to other clinics. My friend got facelift and filler done at banobagi, she was charged SGD24k. Of which, at other clinic, with just as good quality, you'll be paying much lesser. I really have no personal gain by doing this. I could have left and said nothing as i've achieved what I want. Please, do ask me if there's anything that i've missed out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
missnewface Posted April 20, 2016 Share Posted April 20, 2016 Hey anyone doing eyebrow embroidery? PM me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chupachupachup Posted April 21, 2016 Share Posted April 21, 2016 Just an update on my double eyelid search: I went to Opera for a consultation on Tuesday and skipped Teuim and Bando Eyes since I already liked Banobagi and Opera and that was enough choices already. Note: Teuim seems really busy and there is only one doctor there so if you run late to appointments, it's hard to reschedule. About Opera: I liked the place. It's smaller than the other plastic surgery "mega malls" I visited (i.e. BK) and I really like that's it's super conveniently located. The consultant I saw before meeting the doctor was also friendly and just "got it" - like, she understood well what my main priorities were when it came to the surgery and unlike so many other consultants, she didn't try to upsell me on a bunch of different procedures. By the way, this is a common theme I've noticed with these plastic surgery clinics - it's the consultants or managers that often recommend more than you need. Perhaps they get paid in commissions. At ASPS, for example, the consultant insisted I needed to get both my eyes done and that I should go for full anesthesia, even though I told her that scared me. Pretty much every doctor I've consulted told me getting just my one, problem eye done was fine and that partial anesthesia would suffice. Overall, Opera was good - the consultant actually took the time to explain the surgery in detail: how many points they were going to make, the sort of line I could expect, the anesthesia procedure, etc., which was not the case at other clinics. They also quoted the most affordable price - 400,000 KRW for one eye, non-incision. That being said, I actually decided to go with Banobagi. I was trying all day today to decide between the two and ultimately, it was just a Google/Naver search that decided it - the doctor I met with at Banobagi has far more press than the one I met with at Opera. Maybe that shouldn't be a real factor, but I feel better going with someone who seems to have more experience. This is something I was looking for since as "easy" as double eyelid surgery is supposed to be, a few of the doctors I met with just looked really young and I'd prefer someone who's been in the game for awhile, if you know what I mean. My surgery is scheduled for tomorrow! So nervous and a little excited. Will report back on how it went. Wish me luck! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tchu Posted April 21, 2016 Share Posted April 21, 2016 Did you meet Dr Lee? I was having a consultation with Dr Lee and i could feel his confidence The main reason i didn't go with banobagi was because of the price. By the way can anyone teach me how to post a picture here? I would like to share my post op picture. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chupachupachup Posted April 22, 2016 Share Posted April 22, 2016 No, I didn't! I met Dr Park. He was nice, very young, but I felt more comfortable at Banobagi Wish I knew, I kinda want to post one too - I remember I searched the internet for what eyes look like right afterwards and well, I didn't expect this (it's really not that bad!) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chupachupachup Posted April 22, 2016 Share Posted April 22, 2016 So I had my double eyelid surgery this morning and I just want to give some overview on what I learned/experienced through this. Hope it helps someone!What I did: I did double embedding non-incision double eyelid surgery (maemol). I have thin-ish eyelid skin (more medium thickness, really) and I already had a double eyelid but the line wasn't clear. My main reason for doing this was to secure it so I could "open" my eyes easily, without having to use my forehead muscles (that causes wrinkles, yo). The procedure: I was super nervous and scared, I barely even slept last night, but it was seriously not that bad. I only did partial anesthesia, which I was terrified of because...well, needles! In my eyelid! But it was just a few painful pinpricks that lasted under a minute. I didn't feel any pain during the actual procedure, which lasted maybe 15-20 minutes tops. The most uncomfortable thing about the whole experience was the super bright lighting aimed directly into my face (necessary, but doesn't feel fantastic) and the unsettling feeling of having my eyelid tugged and pulled on. Doc was great, had perfect bedside manner, told me briefly what he was doing, when pain or discomfort would start/stop, and made small talk to de-tense me. Was really helpful overall. After the surgery, they put a small piece of gauze over the eyelid and I left - felt no pain, just relief and elation at finally having had this done! Oh, there's a bit of...not discomfort, per se - more a feeling of something different. I'm more used to having my left eye open wider/more easily than my right one so it felt a lil weird to feel the right one as open. Not sure if that makes sense...What I learned/my 2 cents: Don't do more than you need. I mentioned earlier that BK recommended I do ptosis. Another place also recommended I do epi. I really didn't need either. Sure, you might get a bit of a discount by doing it all at once, but IMHO, it might be better to do just what you really need and then see if you really need anything else - you might not. Go with a doctor you feel comfortable with. I had Lasik done like a decade ago and it was the most frightening experience - not just 'cause you're wide awake and unable to blink throughout the entire procedure, but mostly because the doctor was a real jerk and he chose to snap at me every time I winced/involuntarily moved. Bedside manner really matters, especially when you're lying on an operation table alone and scared. Go with a doctor who's willing to listen to your concerns, answers your questions without rushing you and makes you feel comfortable. Partial incisions seems to be out. I thought I'd need a partial incision and asked about this at 2 places and they both said they don't really recommend this anymore. Especially if you're young, don't have too much eyelid fat or saggy skin on your lids, they both said the preferred method is a more secure form of non-incision (like securing it twice or thrice). I also asked one of the consultants which surgery she got - her eyes didn't look natural - and she said partial incision and that she got it awhile back and wouldn't recommend it. Do your due diligence. If you're here, you're probably doing that anyway, but yea...all these clinics are pretty close to each other (by foot, subway or cab) so always get a second (and third and fourth) opinion. Don't be scared. Honestly, this surgery was way less painful and intensive than having my wisdom teeth removed. They gave me Tylenol as a painkiller. It's really not that bad. Last note on prices - Banobagi was one of the more expensive places I went to. I know I could've gotten this done for a lot cheaper, especially since double eyelid surgeons are a dime a dozen in Seoul and I speak fluent Korean. But hey, you're only going to do it once (hopefully) so might as well as get it done where you want to/feel most comfortable. I'll try to post pics later once I figure out how to do it so y'all can see how an eye looks after surgery (I know I was super curious about this) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
setgo Posted April 22, 2016 Share Posted April 22, 2016 To be honest, I think it's cheaper to go by yourself especially if you know a little korean. As you will be able to get to the accommodation and to clinics which have english consultants. Is it possible to get your money back? There are hundreds of clinics I think it worth checking at least 3-4 of them and have different opinions from doctors. Out of curiosity: what did you have for ur first des? only non-incision sutures? FYI, maybe it helps somehow: Cinderella: Price: 2-3 (Inc DES); 1,5-2,2 (Epi); 1,5-2,2 (Lath) ; 3,5-4,5 (Pt) million KRW JW: Price: 2-4 million KRW Inc DES I sent them not through docfinder. And people here say that it's very realistic to get a big discount when you're there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pebblesandbam Posted April 23, 2016 Share Posted April 23, 2016 Which clinic did you go to? This is my first time hearing about double embedding non-incision double eyelid surgery - it sounds interesting! What other clinics did you consult at and do most offer double embedding? Teium recommended that I do partial incision for a natural "scarless" look so it was interesting to hear your opinion. You can kakao me as well: conniec89 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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