La Via Charlotta, MD

I usually don’t take time to write reviews and when I do, like most people, it’s to warn of a bad experience I have had. In this case however, I had such an amazingly pleasant, beyond pleasant, experience with Dr. La Via, that I can’t find enough places to share all the good things I have to say about her. Dr La Via is the best doctor I’ve ever had! She is an incredibly talented surgeon with a genuine, caring bedside manner. I highly recommend Dr. La Via without one bit of hesitation. She truly is wonderful and turned what I thought was going to be a horrible, terrifying experience into no big deal at all. not to mention how pleased I am with her extraordinary talent. GO TO Dr La Via!

I am so very thankful I found Dr. La Via! I literally had to change insurance companies just to make that work, and it took 10 months to do it, but I’m so happy I did. I wanted to have my breast implants removed, not replaced. My previous insurance covered a different doctor who made some very dubious suggestions about my procedure and outcome, then tried to upsell me over and over again on immediately putting in new implants or doing a breast reduction, telling me that I needed it! He didn’t even bother to do any imaging, then scheduled a 5 – 6 hour surgery (I can only imagine it’s because he was going in blind without the imaging). Also, never confirmed that insurance allowed the coverage.
When I went to Dr. La Via, she was amazing. Not only was she comfortable and experienced with successful implant removal, she was very encouraging and informative. She didn’t just tell me what, she told me WHY, which is so important to me. No, it wouldn’t look amazing right away. Her advice: it was essential to remove and NOT replace for at least 3 – 6 months, because my problem was with encapsulation, the body’s scarring mechanism that keeps activated for months after removal, and would only encapsulate again if immediately replaced. Why not try to see how I like living without them first? (Yes!!!) You can always replace later once the scarring response (hopefully) goes away. In my opinion, that other doctor must have known the same thing, but I can’t decide if it’s worse if he was ignorant, or greedy for the upsell, or that he was too inexperienced to trust the outcome.
She arrived early the morning of the surgery, just to make sure everything was ok, and called me from her cell phone that night to check in again, and make sure I understood all the post-​surgery instructions. Her suggestions have all been very practical, and always considerate of my needs. Her staff, Matt and Gia, are also amazingly supportive and thorough. Together, they made sure I had the correct imaging that would show not only where the damage was, and recommend a shorter 2 – 3 hour surgery (less time on anesthesia, thank you!), but it also forced the insurance company to pre-​approve, even though coverage was supposed to be indicated, they can sometimes back out for various reasons. I was covered! Not to mention the surgery center experience was pretty close to a spa experience. So far, I feel so much better without them, and I can see daily improvement in how they look. I can’t thank Dr. La Via enough, and would highly recommend her.