We understand the basis of your query, given the unabating popularity of cosmetic-surgery procedures in the United States. The most recent information we have, from the Washington Post, shows 15.9 million cosmetic surgeries annually (although that conflates surgeries with minimally invasive procedures), with buttock implants rising fast in popularity, although still small in number: 2,540. Over one-third of cosmetic procedures – 6,757,198 – were Botox injections. Subtract collagen, chemical peels, laser hair-removal and microderm abrasion, and the number of surgical procedures lags far, far behind (pardon the pun), in the low hundreds of thousands.
According to Stowe Shoemaker, dean of the William F. Harrah College of Hotel Administration at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas, Sin City already sees a significant amount of "health and wellness travel," with many people coming here for bariatric surgery or to avail themselves of the Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Heath. Plastic surgeons have also gotten a big jump on the spa industry in Las Vegas, with numerous private practices to be found off the Strip.
"While the spas have gotten very sophisticated, plastic surgery demands a different skill – a much bigger thing than a traditional spa," Shoemaker adds, requiring having skilled professionals like anesthesiologists on retainer, to say nothing of doctors and nurses. Some limited cosmetic procedures are coming to Las Vegas spas, Shoemaker says, such as those popular Botox treatments.
Jennifer Lynn, the director of spa services at Mandarin Oriental, writes us, "I can only speak for the one casino resort that I worked for several years ago. We explored the idea with a plastic surgeon, but due to the liability, it was not a business model we wanted to explore further. In order to practice plastic surgery or injection therapies like Botox, Restalyne, etc., you need to run that aspect of the business under the direction of a doctor and the medical (HIPAA) privacy rules. This requires a clear deviation from the spa experience." HIPAA, incidentally, stands for the Health Insurance Portability & Accountability Act, passed in 1996.
There is also the question of the infrastructure needed for invasive procedures, "especially if it is a medical surgical suite," Lynn says. "There would need to be extensive equipment available. In addition, the proper sterilized environment" would be required. "When we explored the medical spa concept at the casino resort, it was mostly for simple, non-invasive procedures such as laser, injections [and] medical-grade facial peels" -- and the concept was still rejected.
Also, coming to a vacation city like Las Vegas to be laid up for any extended period of time would seem to defeat the purpose of the trip. "For the most part, guests come to Las Vegas for entertainment, relaxation and vacation, not to have medically directed services. Oftentimes, the medically directed services require recovery and downtime," says Lynn.
"In my opinion, with all the fun attractions, dining and entertainment, [Vegas] is not the ideal place to want to rest or sleep your days away in a hotel room," she concludes. Factor in the intensiveness of the staffing and infrastructure required, versus the number of Vegas tourists who would come here expressly for plastic surgery, and it is difficult to see a supply-demand equation that works out in the casinos' bottom-line favor, particularly in a city already awash with private practitioners.
So for now, Strip-resort offerings don't delve any deeper into the medical field than the "IV nutrient infusions," cleanses, hydration therapies, and "vitamin booster shots" of facilities like MGM Grand's Reviv "wellness provider." Visitors should be wary of any potentially unlicensed practitioners or experimental therapies, also, noting some of the extreme, even fatal incidents that have taken place here in the past, like last October's tragic cryotherapy tank death in Henderson, or the mother of three who died in 2011 following a botched butt-enhancement procedure that had been performed by an unlicensed couple in the back of a tile store. All we can say is, caveat emptor.
