Australian Surgeon to Teach Scar-Free Laser Technique

A pioneering Australian laser surgeon who reportedly can remove birthmarks without scarring is about to become a visiting scholar at the UCI Medical School, and she hopes soon to be teaching her technique to doctors there and at a Costa Mesa clinic.

Dr. Adrianna Scheibner, 32, is the founder of the Sydney Laser Therapy Clinic, where she has been treating patients with severely disfiguring facial blemishes and other skin abnormalities since 1983.

Michael W. Berns, director of UCI’s Beckman Laser Institute and a UCI surgery professor, said that at his urging, Scheibner will be given a faculty appointment as an unsalaried assistant clinical professor in the department of surgery. He said she will also be doing research at the Laser Institute, a 1 1/2-year-old facility that conducts clinical work and studies the use of lasers in medicine.

A Matter of Processing

Although Scheibner’s appointment through Oct. 31, 1988, has yet to be finalized, it is now just a matter of processing the paper work, said Carol Goldberg, a senior analyst with the UCI School of Medicine.

Scheibner will also be affiliated with a new medical practice in Costa Mesa, DermaCare Medical Group, which is scheduled to open later this month.

Scheibner and Berns stressed, however, that she will not be treating any patients at DermaCare and will only be demonstrating her technique on patients at the Laser Institute after her Australian medical license has been approved by California examiners.

But Berns said he did not expect licensing difficulties because of her reputation and her affiliation as a UCI visiting scholar.

“She is world renowned,” Berns said. “I don’t anticipate there will be a problem in getting her approved.”

Meanwhile, Scheibner will be able to conduct research and demonstrate her technique to other scholars, Berns said. Also, two or three U.S. physicians who have been trained by Scheibner at her Sydney clinic will be performing surgeries starting in January at the Costa Mesa clinic, said Barbara Beckley, a spokeswoman for DermaCare.

In a brief interview Tuesday, Scheibner stressed that she did not plan to treat patients, but rather to teach her innovative surgical technique to U.S. dermatologists.

“My time is best employed in teaching DermaCare doctors how to do the procedure, rather than doing it myself, so that as many people as possible can be treated,” she said.

According to Berns and other laser experts, Scheibner has attracted international attention for her surgery, in which she uses a laser beam to remove physical blemishes such as “port wine” facial stains, tattoos and “spider veins” in the legs. About one person in 1,000 has the disfiguring abnormality known as port wine facial stains, Scheibner said. Among those with such a blemish is Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev.

Berns said a controversy is continuing in the fellowship of laser surgeons over how adept a surgeon must be and how much scarring after surgery is acceptable. Scheibner, who is also a graphic artist, “appears to have some very good technique,” Berns said. “She may have perfected the laser treatment for certain types of skin problems” better than any other laser surgeon practicing today.

“Whether it’s a technique that anyone else can copy or not remains to be seen,” Berns said, but that should be proven as she conducts research at UCI. “Whether it (Scheibner’s technique) is as good as they claim, time will tell.”

Painstaking Tracing

Scheibner’s technique involves an unusually precise application of lasers to facial blemishes in which “she very painstakingly traces out all the (blood) vessels,” said Dr. David Apfelberg, a Palo Alto plastic surgeon who is vice president of the American Society for Laser Medicine and Surgery.

Typically, Scheibner may take 1 1/2 hours to work on a blemished area, on which work by traditional laser surgeons would take 20 minutes, Apfelberg said. “Her rate of scarring is far less than with the traditional procedure.”

Describing how she works with a laser, Scheibner said: “I apply the light to the skin differently so it does not result in a burn (that would scar the patient further). That’s the whole trick to it--how the light is applied to the skin.”

In working on port wine stains, she said, “We have virtually eliminated the scarring. And that is the main worry of patients. They don’t care if it doesn’t change. They do care if it gets worse.”

Scheibner, who Thursday will discuss her technique before some 5,300 dermatologists at the annual American Academy of Dermatology meeting in Texas, said it typically takes doctors two full weeks of study with her to learn the method.