Giving Back : Feeling Like a ‘Prisoner in Your Own Skin’
Dr. ADRIANNA SCHEIBNER, Beverly Hills; Dr. Adrianna Scheibner is the founder of the Brave Hearts Foundation, which treats children who suffer physical and emotional trauma due to skin disfigurement. She began her practice in Australia in 1980 and today practices there and in Beverly Hills.
I began practicing medicine in Australia in 1980. In my intern year I became involved in doing laser treatment at Sydney Hospital with a professor who is a melanoma surgeon. He had the first laser in Australia.
I jumped at the opportunity to use the laser at that time because of what preceded that, which started when I was about 7. I got a severe rash all over my face and for two years my grandmother would take me from one dermatologist to another. They would poke and prod and look down at me from over their glasses and white coats and not treat me like a person who was scared, but like an interesting condition that they didn’t have an answer to. And for two years not knowing when this was going to go away, or if it was ever going to go away, I really got to know what it’s like, walking around like a prisoner in your own skin.
I hear this every single day that patients come in, and it doesn’t matter how severe their problem is. Every time they look in the mirror, they automatically focus in on that problem and they feel caught, trapped; they feel helpless, hopeless. Those feelings affect their self-esteem, every walk of their life. It’s something that other people can really underestimate.
Between 1980 and 1982 I developed a technique with the laser that was one of only two used at the time, called the Argon laser. It was producing scarring virtually 100% of the time in children and up to 30% in adults. Only the most severe port wine birthmarks were treated. In a moment of inspiration, I developed a technique that eliminated this scarring. I was then able to start treating all kinds of cosmetic conditions that were previously not treated in children as young as 12 months of age.
People in the United States and elsewhere heard about it and I came here to teach and decided to stay. I have three doctors working full time at my practice in Australia. I go there approximately twice a year to do interviews and to teach them new techniques.
Over the past two years, I have developed additional techniques to treat scars, which is something I am very excited about. Scars are considered permanent. A lot of people are treating birthmarks now, but not scars. Virtually any kind of scarring can be treated, which has led me to treat abused children, accident victims and gang members who want tattoos removed. Scars are a constant reminder of that original trauma, and especially if it was emotionally traumatic. It takes between two and four treatments for the average scar. Some can take more, especially if it’s deep. I treated one abuse victim who had 262 stitches in one cut.
Ever since I started practicing, I’ve treated everybody, whether they had insurance or not. What’s happened now is that there are so many children, and the costs in the United States are so high, that if I wanted to continue the treatments I had to put something together in a foundation. That’s how Brave Hearts started three years ago. We’re just now getting to the point where we’re doing fund raising.
I came up with the name Brave Hearts because these little children have to be brave. Children are the only ones who are victims. Adults can ask questions. Children are at the mercy of all adults--their parents, the schools, the teachers and the doctor. One boy I’ve been treating since age 12 is now 18. He wants to go to medical school after having gone through this. Another patient I’ve been treating is in nursing school because of having treatments. I started treating her when she was about 14.
The foundation tries to assist them with their schooling. One interesting thing is that a lot of these children want to be movie stars. Maybe it’s a way for them to overcome their problem--to go out and prove themselves to the world.
