Dennis Schimpf, MD - Plastic Surgeon in Charleston, South Carolina

Eva Sheie (00:03):
The purpose of this podcast is simple. We want you to get to know your doctor before meeting them in person because you're making a life-changing decision and time is scarce. The more you can learn about who your doctor is before you meet them, the better that first meeting will be. There's no substitute for an in-person appointment, but we hope this comes close. I'm your host, Eva Sheie, and you're listening to Meet the Doctor. Hello and welcome to Meet the Doctor. It's my pleasure to introduce Dr. Dennis Schimpf. He's a board certified plastic surgeon in Charleston, South Carolina. Thanks for joining me on the show today.

Dr. Schimpf (00:43):
Hi. Thank you so much for having me.

Eva Sheie (00:46):
How did we find each other? I don't even know.

Dr. Schimpf (00:50):
Probably through Forbes. I wrote a book a couple years ago and then wrote a second version and they've been promoting it and I think they probably coordinated this.

Eva Sheie (00:59):
You've written two books. Are they books for patients?

Dr. Schimpf (01:02):
Yeah, they kind of explain what to expect and stuff like that, the normal stuff. I took an example of patients that I treated through the years and kind of common questions that we got asked a lot or scenarios that came up. So each chapter of the book covers one of those, and then it talks a little bit about how surgery can do one aspect of making you feel better about yourself, but obviously beauty, the true meaning of beauty does not come from physical appearance.

Eva Sheie (01:33):
What does it come from?

Dr. Schimpf (01:34):
I think the confidence that folks get, hopefully from having something that bothered them for a long time change and so they feel more confident in themselves and carry themselves differently and hopefully are more outgoing and enjoy themselves.

Eva Sheie (01:48):
Do you think there's a specific moment where you see confidence show up?

Dr. Schimpf (01:53):
Yes, we definitely see a difference in patients who come in before surgery and are timid, embarrassed, just hesitant, and then something like breast augmentation or something like that that they had an insecurity about a lot of times for most of their life is a change and they come back weeks to months later and have a whole new outlook in how they wear clothing, how they carry themselves. Definitely more confidence.

Eva Sheie (02:23):
What inspired you to take the project on of writing books about this? It's not easy to write a book.

Dr. Schimpf (02:29):
No, the book idea actually came from a podcast that I listened to years ago when I was driving a TED Talk about design and a design engineer was talking about how they design things to appear and catch people's attention and how the different lines and shadows of products attract people. And a lot of what we do is dealing with wrinkles and different areas of the body that look good or bad in somebody's opinion and trying to make it so that it looks better and somebody feels better about themselves. And he talked a lot about how products actually are more than just how they appear, it's how they make you feel. And so people have an attachment to 'em and a lot of these major marketing companies like Nike and that they don't really talk about a product, they talk about a feeling that you get from having their product or how they support you in whatever it is you're pursuing. So I think plastic surgery is very similar.

Eva Sheie (03:23):
Do you find yourself in consultations with patients talking about how they're going to feel more than what you're going to do or do you try to make it about them?

Dr. Schimpf (03:32):
100% understanding what their goal is in pursuing plastic surgery because the most perfect procedure operation technically can be great, but if it doesn't address what that patient's goal was or what their expectation was, then they're going to be unhappy. So I think nobody can tell you what your expectation should be.

Eva Sheie (03:55):
How do you line up what vision is inside somebody's head with, how do you get a picture of what is in their head and actually execute on that in real life?

Dr. Schimpf (04:07):
Really by asking them, I really do ask folks to tell me specifically first off, if you do this surgery, what is going to make you happy six months or a year from now? When you look back, how are you going to feel? What is it going to take to make you feel happy that you did this and glad you did it? And I think that's probably the most important question that we ask. And then I have to really on our side decide number one, what's safe, and obviously that's first and foremost, but then what hopefully is going to meet their expectation with an outcome and we have to try to deliver that outcome so that they are happy. And a lot of folks will come in and say, well, you're the doctor plastic surgeon, tell me what I need. And I always tell people, it's kind of a running joke. I can't tell you what's going to make you happy, and I could list 5, 6, 7 things that I could do for somebody, but if it's the eighth thing that bothers them, they're not going to be happy. And so we see ourselves very differently than most people see us. And we're our worst own critic by far.

Eva Sheie (05:10):
Oh, for sure. By a factor of probably a hundred.

Dr. Schimpf (05:14):
Yes. Yeah, absolutely. And so we try to understand what's bothering you and what's causing you concern or insecurity, decide if it can safely be addressed and then come up with a plan that hopefully meets that expectation. And if we can't or we don't have a reasonable plan that I think is going to deliver the results that somebody's looking for, then it's our responsibility to not do anything.

Eva Sheie (05:39):
Do their answers ever surprise you?

Dr. Schimpf (05:42):
Yeah, they do sometimes in the fact that what bothers folks, I am sometimes surprised at either how little something might seem to me or to somebody else. And other times I look at somebody and you think you might assume why they're there to see you, and that's not why they're there.

Eva Sheie (06:00):
You only have to make the mistake of assuming and saying what you're assuming one time before you learn that you shouldn't do that anymore.

Dr. Schimpf (06:08):
Yes, you definitely don't point that out.

Eva Sheie (06:12):
Yeah. I had a boyfriend 20 years ago who said I had a big nose and I have never forgotten it. Cuz, I didn't think so, and I still don't think so.

Dr. Schimpf (06:20):
No, that's very common actually. A brother, sister, family member, spouse, significant other will point something out to somebody and it is amazing how it sticks with them for years. If not a lifetime. And even if it's not accurate, it's unfortunate. I do hear that often somebody will say, kids made fun of me when I was a kid or my brothers or sisters or friend or something. And it is unfortunate, it does stick with people and a lot of times they don't think they had a problem until somebody says that.

Eva Sheie (06:50):
On the other hand, there was a kid in our neighborhood and he had really, really big ears. His ears stuck out off the side of his head, like perpendicular to his head, and he was my brother's best friend. They were little kids. They were seven years, eight years younger than me, and this was a very suburban middle class neighborhood. Nobody had any money in Minneapolis and his parents must have saved for years to get his ears fixed and then his whole life changed because of that. I still know him. And it occurred to me not that long ago that that experience of watching my brother's friend go through that is probably one of the reasons that I fell in love with working on marketing in this space in the first place because I saw it so early change somebody's life.

Dr. Schimpf (07:47):
Yeah, it's amazing. And it can be life changing for folks and especially when they have lived with concern and insecurity over it for so many years that it's definitely a change. And I've equally had the same sort of opposite happen. We've seen folks come in with their parents who are set on getting their ears done or having a procedure and in the end we tell 'em, you actually are normal. I understand that you may not feel that way or because somebody made fun of you, but that doesn't change the fact that actually your ears are normal or undergoing a procedure and all of that is not going to make a dramatic enough change that you're going to think it was worth it. And obviously the other thing is there are risks with everything that we do and scars and things like that. So younger people I think in general don't think that way. And so it's definitely our job to point that out and understand that while the majority of the time things go great, that's not a guarantee and nobody can guarantee that for you.

Eva Sheie (08:53):
How often do you find yourself turning people away?

Dr. Schimpf (08:56):
Not very often. It may be a person or two a month. More commonly it's weight that's an issue. If somebody's over a BMI that's not safe, then that's probably the more, well, it's certainly the more common reason that we don't do surgery on somebody, but it's probably once every couple months that I see somebody who's just either wants something that I don't think we can do or you get the feeling that something's not right and that their expectations aren't right and they're probably not going to be happy no matter what happens.

Eva Sheie (09:29):
I think a big part of this that maybe people who haven't been around plastic surgery don't know yet is that if you start going through the process, you're on the phone with the team quite a few times before you actually come in and they're trying to uncover those kinds of things so that everyone's headed in the right direction.

Dr. Schimpf (09:48):
Yes, definitely. And what people think they need or even the procedure or treatment for the problem is not always accurate. A lot of folks will go online and ask friends or internet and self-diagnose and self-treatment plan, but a lot of times that's not exactly accurate.

Eva Sheie (10:08):
You mean everything on Instagram isn't true?

Dr. Schimpf (10:11):
That's the rumor. I'm not sure.

Eva Sheie (10:14):
I'm a French model. Remember that commercial?

Dr. Schimpf (10:15):
Exactly, exactly.

Eva Sheie (10:19):
That's funny. Okay, so I can see on the cover of your book that it says you also have an MBA.

Dr. Schimpf (10:25):
I do, yes ma'am.

Eva Sheie (10:26):
So you like to go to school?

Dr. Schimpf (10:28):
I did for a while. Yeah, I did. I did actually enjoy it. I went back to business school later in life. I had already been a practicing surgeon for a few years, so it was a different experience. I actually was more in touch with what was going on and not as worried about grades or tests or any of that stuff. So it was actually enjoyable and the kids that were in the program were extremely smart and it was fun to be around a different group of people outside of medicine.

Eva Sheie (10:54):
Were they kids?

Dr. Schimpf (10:55):
Well, at that time, I guess.

Eva Sheie (10:57):
Post college,

Dr. Schimpf (10:58):
Yeah, that program you had to have three to five years of work experience.

Eva Sheie (11:02):
Were you already a business owner at that point?

Dr. Schimpf (11:05):
No, I was actually in academic medicine at that point.

Eva Sheie (11:09):
So did you use it kind of as a springboard to get yourself out?

Dr. Schimpf (11:12):
I did. Yeah.

Eva Sheie (11:14):
Yeah, I bet that was fun. I love school.

Dr. Schimpf (11:17):
It is part of business school is helpful. A lot of the theoretical stuff, so many things doesn't necessarily translate to the real world, but I think it gives you a foundation and ability to understand basics, financial statements, accounting, things like that that at least give you somewhat of an understanding. But certainly the real world is different.

Eva Sheie (11:39):
And there was also an academic segment of your career early on too, wasn't there?

Dr. Schimpf (11:44):
Yes. Yeah.

Eva Sheie (11:46):
So where were you teaching and what kinds of things were you teaching to younger doctors?

Dr. Schimpf (11:50):
Sure. Medical University of South Carolina. I did fellowship training and then stayed on staff and mainly did breast reconstruction for cancer. Microsurgery a procedure called deep inferior epigastric perforator flaps or DIEPs. We did a lot of cancer reconstruction at an NCI cancer center and a little bit of cosmetic surgery, but those years were mainly larger reconstructive procedures.

Eva Sheie (12:17):
Is that the primary center for breast recon in South Carolina?

Dr. Schimpf (12:21):
Yes.

Eva Sheie (12:22):
So the patients are coming from all over the state or beyond even?

Dr. Schimpf (12:25):
Yes. We started a destination care program. It was kind of designed to offer that the higher level of complexity with surgery, especially microsurgery really it's hard to do at smaller hospitals. You need a trained staff and postoperative care is really important. If patients are in the ICU for a couple of days, the surgeries take anywhere from eight to 10 or 12 hours and probably the post-op care is more important than actually the surgery. So you want people that are experienced in that area. So yes, we did a lot and we did over 150 flaps a year, so it was a lot.

Eva Sheie (13:01):
For some people, the process is, I mean for all of them, the process is long and for some it's very long like a multi-year situation.

Dr. Schimpf (13:11):
Yes, and plastic surgery is fun in that area because the women, by the time we do the final reconstruction, they've had a long road. Most of them though, have done well with their cancer treatment and this is the end of the process and they're excited to try to get back to the normalcy, but it's hard. It's a long process and especially a lot of these younger women in their thirties and forties who get it unfortunately.

Eva Sheie (13:40):
Do you still care for any patients in that capacity or not so much anymore?

Dr. Schimpf (13:44):
No, not much anymore just because don't use hospital systems very much and we just don't have the teams to do that anymore and it's better served in an academic center.

Eva Sheie (13:56):
What does your team look like now, today at Sweetgrass?

Dr. Schimpf (13:59):
We have three surgeons, probably five or so mid-level providers, and then we have three offices with surgery centers. And so we have our own operating team, nurses, scrub techs, and anesthesia providers.

Eva Sheie (14:14):
Is there something that you're known for either as a practice or individually as surgeons that people find you for?

Dr. Schimpf (14:22):
We do full body cosmetic plastic surgery, so I tend to do more, I guess face stuff now than I used to years ago. We still do a large number of breast surgeries, breast augmentation, and a lot of abdominoplasty, tummy tuck type stuff. The number one procedure done in the country, and this is true from almost all plastic surgeons, is liposuction. So everyone tends to do that and then kind of branches off into other areas.

Eva Sheie (14:48):
I always think that's a funny stat because it's always combined, I think with other stuff. And so they say it's number one, but you just never hear anybody say like, I specialize in lipo. I'm going to get lipo, I'm doing lipo.

Dr. Schimpf (15:01):
Right. Well, I think a lot of the people may not be advertising that, and it's one of those things you can get away with certainly in the colder months down in the south, having it done and somebody may not know that you're having it done. And it's also something that almost everybody could benefit from some liposuction.

Eva Sheie (15:20):
Very true. I can't think of anyone who wouldn't.

Dr. Schimpf (15:25):
Men, women, old, young, pretty much everybody needs some needs. So

Eva Sheie (15:30):
On the subject of fat, you mentioned earlier that sometimes you have to send people away for being maybe slightly overweight, but you'd have to be under a rock to not know what's going on with Ozempic,Wegovy, Mounjaro laundry list of semaglutide and other GLP one medications. So is that something that you've started working with your patients on?

Dr. Schimpf (15:56):
We have, yes. We started May of 2023 really offering it. First few months we didn't have a lot of patients, and then by the end of the summer it had ramped up where we have a couple hundred patients a month now roughly doing it.

Eva Sheie (16:12):
Can I ask you if you've tried it yourself?

Dr. Schimpf (16:14):
I have, yeah, I tried it. Yeah. Yeah, it definitely works. I was amazed actually when I tried it. I tend to poo poo everything and not think it's going to work, but that I felt nauseous for a lot of it, but the way it makes you not want to eat and look at food differently is pretty amazing. Yeah, I was really surprised actually at how effective it was. And I've had family members do it who needed to lose some weight and they've lost a good bit of weight on it. I'm pretty surprised. But they also kind of dove in and knew this was a chance to really kind of get themselves and change their diets and cut back on a lot of the unhealthy things that they had done to get to that point. But the effectiveness of the medicine is pretty amazing.

Eva Sheie (17:02):
There's a few misconceptions that I think are worth mentioning. One is that you can only use it if you have a lot of weight to lose.

Dr. Schimpf (17:11):
Right.

Eva Sheie (17:12):
And that's not necessarily true, is it?

Dr. Schimpf (17:15):
No, there are FDA recommendations based on BMI or how heavy or how much you weigh for your height, but anyone will get an effect from it. I believe it's just a matter of getting to the right dose for you that specifically works for you. And then long-term, trying to understand what that looks like and how much of a role that medicine plays in that. I think one of the better explanations I've heard is listening to a doctor talk about it who is a weight loss specialist, and basically if you're overweight to the point that you're obese, it's a disease and you have to treat it like a disease, which almost all of their diseases, hypertension and all of that hypercholesterolemia require medicine for life usually or some degree of it. So I think that's probably the case with this as well.

Eva Sheie (18:04):
It's nice that after all these years, and I think when we were all younger, we used to wish for medication that would solve for this problem, and now we have it. And it seems like there's still quite a lot of controversy about it, but I appreciate your explanation about it being a disease.

Dr. Schimpf (18:22):
Yes, definitely. And you hear people ask us that regularly, well, what about the side effects? And to some degree, well, the medicine's been around a long time for use in the world of diabetes, so there is a pretty strong basis of what the medication performs like, but in non-diabetics trying to lose weight, there's not a lot of data until the last year or so. I think ultimately though, if you're looking at obesity versus to my knowledge of the side effects that these medicines cause your long-term health is much better on the medicine than having obesity, hypertension, heart disease, all of these things that we now know are dramatically impactful on your life expectancy.

Eva Sheie (19:06):
Did you have any side effects yourself?

Dr. Schimpf (19:09):
Just the nausea that I got, nauseous at a lot of the doses of it, even the lower dose, but it was short term and I used to love to drink tequila. I don't love tequila anymore, so it does have an effect on alcohol as well, which is real. And definitely where I could have had a few drinks in a row and enjoyed it. Now drinking one drink is difficult.

Eva Sheie (19:30):
That's a sort of surprise effect on other things like addiction, I'm not calling you an addict by any stretch of anybody's imagination, but I have seen a lot of chatter about it fixing other things, even like shopping addiction or.

Dr. Schimpf (19:46):
Wow, I hadn't heard that one, but that's good.

Eva Sheie (19:50):
Yeah. What is in this stuff?

Dr. Schimpf (19:52):
Yeah.

Eva Sheie (19:54):
There's a lot to you. I think there's a lot of layers. We could probably keep going for a long time. I read on your website that you have seven kids.

Dr. Schimpf (20:02):
I do. I had six children and adopted one, so it's been fun. They're getting older, which makes it kind of interesting to see them begin living their own lives. And the older kids are all three or four older ones are very athletic, so it's been fun to watch them go off to college and do their thing. It's been good.

Eva Sheie (20:21):
Now I have to ask you, what do you drive when you have to drive everybody in the same vehicle?

Dr. Schimpf (20:26):
Well, at that point in time, sprinter van or whatever it's called.

Eva Sheie (20:29):
Sprinter.

Dr. Schimpf (20:29):
Yeah. But now I've bought so many cars for so many children that four of them drive, so they all are independent now.

Eva Sheie (20:40):
What was the most you ever had in diapers at one time?

Dr. Schimpf (20:43):
Three. At least three, maybe four. I don't actually remember the first. The oldest is 21, 20 and then 18, 17 and then 14, 13, 11, 12.

Eva Sheie (20:58):
Do you remember their names? All of them.

Dr. Schimpf (21:00):
Oh yeah, I know all their names. But I did have an incident with TSA when I was traveling with, I think I had three or four of them with me and I couldn't remember the birthdays for all of them. And the guy was looking at me like I was crazy. And to the third child, I got the years mixed up and the guy looked at him and was like, is this your dad? And my son was like, yes. And he's like, okay, go ahead.

Eva Sheie (21:22):
Yep. When they asked my daughter, who is this lady? She always says my first name. And then they're always like.

Dr. Schimpf (21:28):
That's a little strange.

Eva Sheie (21:29):
I'm mom. Gosh.

Dr. Schimpf (21:30):
Right. The mom, miss mom. Yeah. That's funny.

Eva Sheie (21:36):
Well, certainly you can't do all of this without a good team at home. And it sounds like you have that too.

Dr. Schimpf (21:42):
Yeah, they've done really well and actually having a lot of kids close in age like that, and honestly the first two being girls was huge because they're just so put together and help with the other children. The boys are useless at times, but girls are, for now. Girls are definitely different and very helpful. And I'm hopeful that one of the four of them will take care of me when I'm old and decrepit and hopefully somebody will stick around for me.

Eva Sheie (22:08):
Yeah, I only have two contenders for that and I have no idea which one of them it's going to be.

Dr. Schimpf (22:12):
Yeah.

Eva Sheie (22:14):
If you ever had any free time, what would you do with it?

Dr. Schimpf (22:19):
I go back and forth. I used to run a lot a few years ago. I kind of got out of that. I worked out a lot for a while. I've kind of lessened up on that right now. I try to do things, go watch my children. Like I said, the ones, couple 'em play golf and college and one plays football and Florida. And so I try to do that stuff. And right now it's just, I joke around, I used to think I was busy now each month or year seems to get more busy, but I think it gets more enjoyable with time. It takes time to get used to that activity level, if you will. And I've been very fortunate. The business has grown really well and we've expanded and so there's still normal headaches every day and frustrations, but it does change as you get older for sure. And I think your perspective changes tremendously.

Eva Sheie (23:12):
It's a good thing.

Dr. Schimpf (23:13):
It is not always an easy lesson to learn, but it is a good thing.

Eva Sheie (23:19):
I agree. So you've written two books. Can you give us the titles and I'll make sure we put the links in the show notes so that if anyone's listening and they want to check 'em out.

Dr. Schimpf (23:28):
Well, first one was called Finding Beauty, and the second one was Finding the New You. And they're two different versions of basically the same book. One was published by Advantage Media, which was a subsidiary of Forbes. And then the second one, we actually teamed up with Forbes and they're doing a lot for us with a website and promoting the book as well as me to kind of get that message out. And I wrote the book to kind of be a useful guide for family members as well as patients. And it's not about me or our practice, it's really for anybody considering plastic surgery.

Eva Sheie (24:01):
If someone's listening and they want to find you online or find more about you, where should they go?

Dr. Schimpf (24:05):
Sure. I have a personal website, Dr. Dennis Schimpf.com. And then Sweetgrass Plastic Surgery is the name of the practice and the books available on Forbes and Amazon.

Eva Sheie (24:17):
Excellent. Check it out. Thank you for finding the time to talk to us today. I really appreciate it.

Dr. Schimpf (24:23):
Thank you. I enjoyed it. It was great. I wish you the best and if I can do anything else, please let me know.

Eva Sheie (24:28):
Will do.

Dr. Schimpf (24:29):
Alright, thank you.

Eva Sheie (24:34):
If you are considering making an appointment or are on your way to meet this doctor, be sure to let them know you heard them on the Meet the Doctor podcast. Check the show notes for links including the doctor's website and Instagram to learn more. Are you a doctor or do you know a doctor who'd like to be on the Meet the Doctor podcast? Book your free recording session at Meet the doctor podcast.com. Meet the Doctor is Made with Love in Austin, Texas and is a production of The Axis, THE AXIS.io.