Dr. Katie Clinic – A Technically Advanced Aesthetic Clinic helping Patients with a Personal Touch

Aesthetic medicine has improved significantly in the recent past and has become safer and more practical, hence being preferred over traditionally more invasive methods. Today, medical science has transformed leaps and bounds, yet there is a considerable lack of awareness about aesthetic medicine. Most people still consider aesthetic medicine to be basically cosmetic surgery, but it is certainly more than that. Aesthetic medicine can be considered as a broad term for both invasive methods like plastic surgery, but also non-surgical procedures like skin tightening with radiofrequency, high intensity focused ultrasound, skin rejuvenating lasers etc. Today, likewise most aesthetic problems like scars, excessive hair growth, skin discoloration, etc., can be treated with non-invasive laser devices.

Aesthetic physicians specialize in a wide variety of minimally invasive treatments to enhance the physical appearance of patients. It also requires physicians to acquire the medical knowledge of beauty, skin, aging, and other subtle factors to apply all with their artistic instinct. With so many improvements in medical technology, non-invasive procedures are preferred over surgical methods worldwide. For example, in the past decade, a single laser facial session used to take almost a week to recover, with transitional side effects such as redness, pain, and swelling. But now, with technological advancements, it is just an hour’s job. This means there is very little effect on your daily living with very minimal reactions. Apart from this, automated and assisted surgery systems allow more precision, miniaturization, and smaller incisions.

One such popular clinic famous for its excellence in aesthetic medicine services is Dr. Katie Clinic, based in Hong Kong. The clinic was founded by Dr. Katie Lau, which she started in 2017 after gaining more than ten years of experience in the field. Dr. Katie believes that it is crucial to stay ahead in the medical field to keep up with the ever-growing world. She makes this definitely sure for both herself as well as her teams. Dr. Katie is open to sharing her know-how’s and expertise with her staff through seminars and other trainings, locally and overseas. Apart from delivering knowledge, she also stays updated with the latest clinical devices and treatment techniques being developed worldwide. She holds regular meetings with her staff to summarize and modify operations, as well as pass all related skills and knowledge to them. Thus, clinic standards and services are always up to date with the latest improvements worldwide.

“Dr. Katie’s biggest mission is to help patients tackle problems, whether medical or personal, while upkeeping their best selves at the same time.”

Positive clinical environment and satisfied clients

At Dr. Katie Clinic, teamwork is the main focus and internal culture. Professional duties are executed as a team, making sure hierarchy is minimal. This also ensures a better working environment where everyone enjoys work and moves forward positively in their career. Ultimately, the conducive work environment also ensures positivity on the faces of staff and patients. A collaborative and thriving environment permanently imprints a positive experience on patients’ minds, driving them to recommend the clinic to their friends, and family as well. 

Dr. Katie herself ensures patients’ comfort, complete procedure safety with excellent clinical results. Treatment starts with a holistic approach. Each patient is assessed individually, then step-wise treatment plans are tailor-made according to their specific needs. The clinic not only take cares of the professional aesthetic aspects of patients, but also their psychological aspects and person as a whole. This is unique to the clinic.

To illustrate this further, Dr. Katie had a middle-aged woman patient who came with melasma over bilateral cheeks. She had received some laser treatments for freckles from another beauty center before, resulting in more diffused and darker pigmentations. Dr. Katie helped her get over it via manipulation of appropriate laser wavelengths with proper energy levels after full dermatological assessment, and the treatment yielded rapid, visible effects. During subsequent follow-ups, the patient gradually revealed that she was actually in the midst of a marriage crisis, and this “beautification” change on her skin had boosted her confidence to face her challenge; that is why she was so keen to seek medical help. Delighted by the successful treatment, she eventually referred her friend, who introduced the other beauty center, to consult Dr. Katie.

Patients of Dr. Katie Clinic come from multiple professional, cultural, and international ethnic backgrounds, including celebrities who have high levels of expectations. A Hong Kong celebrity client once visited Dr. Katie Clinic and complained of exhausted and saggy look in front of the camera. As she is a celebrity, any imperfections would almost be entirely enlarged on the screen. Therefore, she needed a near “perfect” treatment to achieve “the ideal photogenic effect.” A combination of social media and in-person analysis identified depressed temples and lower face laxity due to muscle over-contraction to be the roots of concern. To fix these issues, Dr. Katie performed an ultrasonic skin tightening device, followed by injecting respective products to fill both temples and relax the masseter muscles involved in chewing and jaw movements. As a result, the overall golden ratio was restored. In merely around two months, not only her work opportunities started to roll off with her enhanced presentation, but she could also skip makeup when with family and friends, and get compliments on her natural youth. This unexpected double joy meant so much to her.

Overcoming the pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic seriously impacted the world, causing significant damages to businesses worldwide, and Hong Kong was no exception. Fortunately, Dr. Katie Lau’s clinic was not much affected as it was technically ahead and digitally prepared to handle the situation. Interestingly, it created some opportunities for them in return. The clinic was fortunate to be able to maintain service during the pandemic. The key to survival for Dr. Katie remained to be quality and important contributing factors like sportsmanship, attitude, toughness towards striking challenges, goals to meet perfection, - all invaluable influences, and success characters, which she had learnt from being an elite swimmer, as early as in teenage years. However, to keep operating, the clinic had to impose stringent precautions. Prior to any clinic visits, no overseas traveling was allowed, without any exemptions. Appointments were arranged according to official social distancing protocols and all generic COVID-19 vaccination schedule interval guidelines. Complete patient visit data were also fully documented.

Overall, since the clinic’s establishment, instead of transforming and expanding as a business, Dr. Katie has tried to put the majority of focus on professional development. This is because, as a doctor, she believes her biggest mission is to help patients tackle problems, whether medical or personal, while upkeeping their best selves at the same time. For her career in the years to come, she wants to do good on more complicated and advanced scenarios by treating with her accumulated skills and techniques clinically, also sharing to counterparts and the public, by way of various channels, like authoritative medical literatures, conferences, seminars, hands-on training, teaching videos, books, educational courses, and even an aesthetic school.

Meet the Founder

Dr. Katie Lau is the Founder of Dr. Katie Clinic, which provides aesthetic medicine services in Hong Kong. She graduated from the University of Hong Kong in 2006 and finished three years of basic surgical training in 2010. After that, Dr. Katie practised privately for ten years in aesthetic medicine and later started her own clinic in 2017.

Apart from being a doctor, she was also a professional athlete. She started training for competitive swimming at the age of 8 and was the silver medalist for the 4 x 100 meters Freestyle Relay of the Asian Games in Hiroshima, 1994. She was the Hong Kong Record Holder of 100 meters Butterfly for a period of 9 years since 1993 and attained World Ranking number 16 that year too, the first Hong Kong swimmer to have achieved such a World Ranking title.

“At Dr. Katie clinic, teamwork is the main focus and internal culture. Professional duties are executed as a team making sure hierarchy is minimal.”