Should We Remove Dr. Diep?

[Fue3361]

6 hours ago, 15thaccount said:

What I don’t get it is why did it take some guy from Reddit to make melvin do this and him not remove this guy unilaterally when people been complaining about him for a long time . And he still made people do a poll lol. If the guy on Reddit didn’t shine light on it or force this upon Melvin it wouldn’t never have been done which makes me question hrn integrity as mentioned by the mod 

From my point of view, it was an obvious “remove”.  But I like to give people the benefit of the doubt.  You have to realize that Melvin had a successful surgery with Dr. Diep, and personal experience can cause a strong bias, as it tends to weight a lot more than anecdotal evidence from other sources.

[JayLDD]

1 hour ago, Fue3361 said:

From my point of view, it was an obvious “remove”.  But I like to give people the benefit of the doubt.  You have to realize that Melvin had a successful surgery with Dr. Diep, and personal experience can cause a strong bias, as it tends to weight a lot more than anecdotal evidence from other sources.

I don't think its unfair to suggest this or for anyone to feel some bias for their doctor especially in the case they had good work done. Its a big psychological impact to consider, very few people are above it.  

The sad part is it still seems as if Diep has a substantive number of very strong cases even recently, the ethics issues, punch sizes and lack of micro-irregularities are all issues that could be rectified. The reality is he could cut his caseload 50% and still likely be making what most would consider obscene amounts of money. It feels like the clinic has trended in the opposite direction over time but the guy is obviously a very talented surgeon. 

[bw77]

Hi all,

I'm a former patient of Dr Diep. I was inspired by Melvin's result (back in the HT Soon days) and so I decided to travel internationally for my surgery in 2017. I owe the community a thread discussing my results and so standby. I recieved 2300 grafts and the result, although not perfect was life changing. 

I agree with some of the comments that have been made about MHTA's front and back office operations. Given how much I was spending and how far I was travelling I expected a much smoother administrative process; however, at the time all I really cared about was the result and so I was prepared to ignore everything else.

Why I selected Dr Diep - at the time, Dr Diep was the only Doctor that agreed to speak to me (free of charge) as part of the consultation process and he was the only doctor regularly posting comb-through videos with patients of a variety of hair types. There's a lot of "smoke and mirrors" within the industry and two dimensional images give docs the opportunity to mask imperfections. Dr Diep's comb throughs gave me a degree of confidence that I couldn't get when looking at the best images from the other clinics. At the time, I felt like Dr Diep was being more transparent about his results than any other clinic. 

About punch size - I knew his punch size was larger than other good docs but his results were great in 2016/2017 and so I was prepared to take a slight hit with scarring. I communicated with some former patients and they indicated that the holes ultimately healed well and so did mine. I do think the larger holes took longer to heal than the smaller holes I see these days but as mentioned, I went into the surgery knowing this. Nobody twisted my arm. 

My only issue with Dr Diep's clinic is the issue I have with almost all clinics and something I think we as a community should work to address. The techs remain largely anonymous and in many cases they can make or break transplant surgery. Every clinic tells their patients that their techs are experts that have been with them forever, but we all know that life happens and techs like any other employee can come and go. I think our community should demand transperancy with techs and we should get to know their names just as well as we know names like Bisanga, Feriduni and Konior. Particularly for heavily tech reliant clinics like H & W and some others. None of us want to be guinea pigs for a clinics new techs.

At this point, I'm going to refrain from voting on this topic as I'm honestly quite conflicted, but I will say this process raises questions about our network of docs more broadly. I know this will muddy the waters and this isn't the intent of this thread, but I do think our recommended docs all need to be assessed more closely. 

We have coalition docs on the list that still use antiquated practices (like Artas machines) and in some cases we haven't seen good results from these docs for years. On their web pages, some of their good results are sub par when compared with the rock stars of today. 

Overall I would give my surgery with Dr Diep an 8/10 as there are some imperfections; however, we all know that first passes are never perfect and my result was genuinely life changing. Some of the testimonies I've read from other patients have been alarming and so I do understand the caution that the community is now taking. 

Thanks for everything you do for this community Melvin!

 

 

[Melvin- Admin]

4 hours ago, Fue3361 said:

From my point of view, it was an obvious “remove”.  But I like to give people the benefit of the doubt.  You have to realize that Melvin had a successful surgery with Dr. Diep, and personal experience can cause a strong bias, as it tends to weight a lot more than anecdotal evidence from other sources.

This guy is a troll, sukh123. I was already speaking to Pat before that thread was created. I wanted to speak to the last patient in detail before making our decision. That was on Wednesday, the Reddit mod created the thread on Friday. 

 

[NikosHair]

@Melvin- Moderator Has the doctor been contacted for his response to these serious accusations. It seems strange that an established doctor would allow his reputation to be destroyed publicly and not even provide a statement in defence.

Is this an admission of failure or a lack of interest in engaging with community?

I feel the doctor in question should be given the right of reply.

[Melvin- Admin]

4 minutes ago, NikosHair said:

@Melvin- Moderator Has the doctor been contacted for his response to these serious accusations. It seems strange that an established doctor would allow his reputation to be destroyed publicly and not even provide a statement in defence.

Is this an admission of failure or a lack of interest in engaging with community?

I feel the doctor in question should be given the right of reply.

I have not contacted the physician yet. I will give him the chance to respond publicly, but in my opinion, it will do little to change minds that are already made up. Again, it was never my intention to hurt anyone’s reputation. That was never the purpose of this thread. In this particular case, given he has so many successful procedures and happy patients on the forum. I thought the fair and balanced approach would be to allow the community to decide.

[NikosHair]

22 minutes ago, Melvin- Moderator said:

I have not contacted the physician yet.

This seems most irregular.

Imagine a judge and jury deciding your fate without even getting the opportunity to mount a defence.

There will be some members who have already made up their mind but equally others that deserve to hear from the doctor before they cast an informed vote.

[Melvin- Admin]

2 minutes ago, NikosHair said:

This seems most irregular.

Imagine a judge and jury deciding your fate without even getting the opportunity to mount a defence.

There will be some members who have already made up their mind but equally others that deserve to hear from the doctor before they cast an informed vote.

This thread was created at the end of the day on Friday. I am not going to contact the physician over the weekend. I will contact him today, as I have already stated. 

 

 

[HairRun]

4 hours ago, bw77 said:

 My only issue with Dr Diep's clinic is the issue I have with almost all clinics and something I think we as a community should work to address. The techs remain largely anonymous and in many cases they can make or break transplant surgery. Every clinic tells their patients that their techs are experts that have been with them forever, but we all know that life happens and techs like any other employee can come and go. I think our community should demand transperancy with techs and we should get to know their names just as well as we know names like Bisanga, Feriduni and Konior. Particularly for heavily tech reliant clinics like H & W and some others. None of us want to be guinea pigs for a clinics new techs.

Shapiro Medical does this, one of the many reasons I went with them. I am not aware of anyone else who does this

https://shapiromedical.com/about/meet-the-staff/

[NikosHair]

1 hour ago, Melvin- Moderator said:

This thread was created at the end of the day on Friday. I am not going to contact the physician over the weekend. I will contact him today, as I have already stated. 

IMO this sets a worrying precedent for ANY doctor sponsoring the site.

The fact that a doctor can be subject to a public execution without the courtesy of allowing them to present a formal defence is worrying. Remember the effects reverberate well beyond HRN. 

I understand the clamour for action after the report of the young guy's procedure. BUT a measured response stating the doctor has been contacted and we await his reply is appropriate BEFORE further action. Fridays/weekend etc is irrelevant if a process is followed.

The most disappointing aspect is any leverage the site may have had to help the young guy will have been lost.

 

[HappyMan2021]

6 minutes ago, NikosHair said:

The fact that a doctor can be subject to a public execution

Seriously?

[NikosHair]

9 minutes ago, HappyMan2021 said:

Seriously?

Not in the literal sense

Can't be any worse than 'Should we remove Dr. Diep' which sounds like a mafia hit☺️

And for the record I'm not defending the doc. I see the strong case for removal.

[Melvin- Admin]

12 minutes ago, NikosHair said:

Not in the literal sense

Can't be any worse than 'Should we remove Dr. Diep' which sounds like a mafia hit☺️

And for the record I'm not defending the doc. I see the strong case for removal.

This was a fair approach to allow the community to decide, without my input, which is already perceived as biased. I laid out all of the threads which included many fantastic results. 

No matter what we do, we will always be criticized, damned if we do, damned if we don’t. At the very least, everyone here see’s that were truly transparent and open. At the end of the day, we are patient advocates. 

[NikosHair]

1 hour ago, Melvin- Moderator said:

everyone here see’s that were truly transparent and open.

As you are aware the lack of transparency is often criticized (not just here but in all walks of life). I'm sure the community welcomes the transparent and open approach.

In that spirit of transparency will HRN publish the disciplinary procedure for the removal of doctors? If one doesn't exist can you/Pat commit to producing one and publishing it.

I know it's a thankless task trying to appease everyone but getting it down in black and white goes a long way.

 

 

[Melvin- Admin]

I will be locking this thread until I speak with Dr. Diep, and I will re-open it if and when he decides to respond. 

I had a long and lengthy discussion with Dr. Diep. It’s been a few days, so I’m not sure if he’s going to respond. At this point, we have removed Dr. Diep from our recommended list. 

Onwards and upwards,