The United Kingdom's injectables market is experiencing rapid growth, but the lack of robust regulation has raised concerns. QUAD A's Executive Director, Tom Terranova, co-authored a recent article in the British Journal of Surgery. The article, titled "Profiling UK Injectable Aesthetic Practitioners: A National Cohort Analysis" highlights a groundbreaking study in which researchers conducted a systematic search to analyze aesthetic practitioners in the UK. They discovered 3,667 practitioners involved in injectable practice, with doctors comprising 32% of the total. Dentists and dental nurses accounted for 24% and 8%, respectively. The study also identified 27 specialties represented in the cohort, with Plastic Surgery being the dominant specialty at 37%. This analysis provides crucial information on the backgrounds and experience of practitioners, highlighting potential risks to patients and informing proposed legislation to introduce industry licensing.
Introduction
The United Kingdom injectables market has been growing rapidly. The lack of formal, robust regulation has led to the UK Government seeking to evaluate methods of regulating the industry, as very little information or evidence is available regarding practitioners. We aim to provide a descriptive and qualitative analysis of the advertised practitioners in the United Kingdom.
Methods
Between June-December 2022, we performed a systematic search using the internet search engine Google to perform a qualitative descriptive analysis of aesthetic practitioners in the UK. For each contiguous country in the UK: England, Scotland, and Wales, five searches were performed. The list of practitioners was then cross-referenced with professional regulatory bodies.
Results
3,667 practitioners were identified as those undertaking injectable practice. Doctors formed the majority of practitioners at 32%. Dentists and dental nurses formed 24% and 8% respectively of practitioners, and trainee dental nurses– 2%. Of the 1,163 doctors identified, a total of 481 were on the specialist register (41%) and 219 were on the GP register (19%). A total of 27specialties were represented in this cohort analysis. Plastic Surgery formed the majority of those who were on the specialist register at 37%, followed by Dermatology at 18%. Conclusion:
This paper is the first to describe the range of practitioners, their professional backgrounds and experience who perform non-surgical aesthetic interventions. The range of backgrounds may have an impact on the potential risks to patients and will be an important consideration in proposed legislation to introduce licensing to the industry.
Read the full article to delve into this comprehensive analysis of the UK's aesthetic industry.
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