Stanley Okoro, MD - Plastic Surgeon in Marietta, Georgia
Dr. Stanley Okoro lovingly refers to his diverse team and patients as the “united nations of plastic surgery,” where he relies on his uniquely broad expertise to help patients from all walks of life look and feel great.
Dr. Okoro’s philosophy is to...
Dr. Stanley Okoro lovingly refers to his diverse team and patients as the “united nations of plastic surgery,” where he relies on his uniquely broad expertise to help patients from all walks of life look and feel great.
Dr. Okoro’s philosophy is to promote facial and body harmony through the full range of surgical and non-surgical cosmetic treatments.
A long and unique journey shaped Dr. Okoro into the plastic surgeon and person he is today. He was born and raised in Nigeria before moving to the United States and lived in many cities across the country throughout his education, eventually falling in love with Atlanta.
Prior to opening his successful practice in metro Atlanta, Dr. Okoro served 12 years as a general and plastic surgeon in the U.S. Navy. Beyond his busy private practice in Georgia, Dr. Okoro sees patients internationally in Lagos and Abuja, Nigeria.
To learn more about Dr. Stanley Okoro
Learn more about Dr. Okoro’s med spa, Amachi
Follow Dr. Okoro on Instagram
ABOUT MEET THE DOCTOR
The purpose of the Meet the Doctor podcast is simple. We want you to get to know your doctor before meeting them in person because you’re making a life changing decision and time is scarce. The more you can learn about who your doctor is before you meet them, the better that first meeting will be.
When you head into an important appointment more informed and better educated, you are able to have a richer, more specific conversation about the procedures and treatments you’re interested in. There’s no substitute for an in-person appointment, but we hope this comes close.
Meet The Doctor is a production of The Axis.
Made with love in Austin, Texas.
Are you a doctor or do you know a doctor who’d like to be on the Meet the Doctor podcast? Book a free 30 minute recording session at meetthedoctorpodcast.com.
Eva Sheie (00:03):
The purpose of this podcast is simple. We want you to get to know your doctor before meeting them in person because you're making a life-changing decision and time is scarce. The more you can learn about who your doctor is before you meet them, the better that first meeting will be. There's no substitute for an in-person appointment, but we hope this comes close. I'm your host, Eva Sheie, and you're listening to Meet the Doctor. You're listening to Meet the Doctor, and my guest is Dr. Stanley Okoro, who's a plastic surgeon based in the Atlanta area. Welcome to the show.
Dr. Okoro (00:40):
Thank you, Eva. Long time, no see.
Eva Sheie (00:42):
You were on my very first podcast when I was testing podcasting. That was at ASPS in San Diego, I think. And that would've been, gosh, four, five years ago. So welcome back. Look, I'm still doing it.
Dr. Okoro (00:58):
That's good. Congratulations. I'm happy for your success.
Eva Sheie (01:01):
Thank you. I'm very happy to be better at interviewing now than I was five years ago. So let's start with you. Tell us a little bit about your practice and what that looks like.
Dr. Okoro (01:15):
So we have what we call the United Nations of Plastic Surgery. We have a very diverse practice, both in our teams and patients that we serve. The practice we just celebrated our 13th year in practice in prior practice.
Eva Sheie (01:34):
Congratulations.
Dr. Okoro (01:35):
Our patients continue to support our success and we appreciate that and we have a great team. I can't do anything that I do now without my team. Team is, where it's at. I love my team. That great. The average team member in our practice stands about four or five years. So some range between two years and 13 years as team members. So they're very seasoned, were trained and I think I owe the success to them.
Eva Sheie (02:10):
Your number one team member still working with you?
Dr. Okoro (02:12):
Yep. Yep. Georgia Plastic's like a club. Once you check in, you can't check out.
Eva Sheie (02:20):
I'm not sure that's how that's usually used.
Dr. Okoro (02:22):
I know, but it's just the way it is at Georgia Plastic.
Eva Sheie (02:25):
It works.
Dr. Okoro (02:26):
When people come and even when they leave, they want to come back. We believe in the team efforts. We believe in treating people well. I think we treat people the way you would like to be treated. That's the gold standard, I think. And then when they're happy, they treat your patients well too.
Eva Sheie (02:45):
So true. You also opened a med spa. What year did you do that?
Dr. Okoro (02:50):
So our med spa, Amachi Med Spa, actually we opened it 2012, but we didn't launch it officially as a separate med spa. It was just attached as a med spa next to the practice. But about five to seven years ago, we actually launched it officially.
Eva Sheie (03:15):
So it was just kind of part of the plastic practice and then you gave it a name and
Dr. Okoro (03:19):
Yeah.
Eva Sheie (03:20):
Mad it its own thing?
Dr. Okoro (03:21):
Yes. So we made it its own entity, but I remember we had a separate space for it 2012, and we had people assigned to a working and then it just started to grow. It grew and you need more space. So we said this is, and we recognize that the me spa industry is growing so much that is really the next frontier in aesthetic medicine.
Eva Sheie (03:49):
So true.
Dr. Okoro (03:50):
Yeah. So I always tell people the me spa is more expandable than the practice itself.
Eva Sheie (03:57):
In terms of plastic surgery, are there certain procedures or sets of procedures that you're known for?
Dr. Okoro (04:04):
Well, I've always want to be known as a plastic surgeon for the person. I didn't want to box myself into just the face, the breast or the butt guy because it doesn't really do justice to my education, my training and experience. If you remember, I was a fully trained general surgeon. I actually practiced general surgery for four years before I went back and trained in plastic surgery for another three years. So I was being trained for a long time. So I'm one of those last boy scouts. They don't make me anymore.
Eva Sheie (04:48):
They don't?
Dr. Okoro (04:49):
They don't train plastic surgeries like me anymore.
Eva Sheie (04:51):
That was in the military. And I'm going to ask you about that.
Dr. Okoro (04:53):
Yeah.
Eva Sheie (04:53):
Do they still train surgeons in the military that way?
Dr. Okoro (04:56):
No,
Eva Sheie (04:57):
Not really.
Dr. Okoro (04:57):
No. This is after us, you will not get surgeons like us anymore because I have the tremendous amount of experience I have as a general surgeon and as a plastic surgeon in the civilian ward and in the military, you can't get those anymore. So that's why I'm very comfortable with the face, the breast, the abdomen. So pretty much it depends on the season of the person. And then I don't do everything obviously, but I focus on the face, the breast and body now.
Eva Sheie (05:32):
What I like about the way you think here is it's really about the patient and not about you. And especially in marketing, we want to reflect back to the person that we're marketing to. And it's not a marketing tactic, but it feels better.
Dr. Okoro (05:47):
Yeah. When patients come to me, I always tell them, if I do your breast surgery or your tummy or your butt, and if somebody mentions that you have a nice breast or tummy your butt, then I've done your disservice because people come to me to look good. So my average person will tell me, I've given them confidence, they look good, they feel good. And if I do your nose, I don't want anybody to mention that you have a nice nose, but you look great, you have a nice face. So for me it's about facial and body harmony. That's why I see the total package. That's why I don't want to be boxed into the eye plastic surgeon, the nose. But I do all of that stuff and that I feel very comfortable doing.
Eva Sheie (06:34):
And what kinds of things do your patients say to you after they're done with recovery and kind of past the point where.
Dr. Okoro (06:40):
Thank you for making me feel whole. Thank you for giving me the confidence I needed to feel like a woman or a man because I would do men and women now. Thank you for making me feel like I'm 10 years or 15 years younger and I can feel like I accomplish anything I want to do. Those are the kind of feedback I get. Thank you for giving me back myself.
Eva Sheie (07:07):
So your journey, you're sitting in front of me at a plastic surgery meeting in the exhibit hall with a booming plastic surgery practice in a med spa. But your journey to get to that place was long and unusual.
Dr. Okoro (07:22):
Yes.
Eva Sheie (07:23):
Without taking too long to tell it, can you kind of take us through your life and how you ended up here?
Dr. Okoro (07:31):
So I was born in Nigeria. My father brought me, my parents brought me to Washington DC to go to school. So I finished school, went to Nashville at Meharry Medical College. That's where I went to medical school, love Meharry, proud Meharry. And here and then from Meharry came to Emory, Emory University in Atlanta. That's how I ended up in Atlanta actually. So I became a full-fledged surgeon at Emory in Atlanta.
Eva Sheie (07:58):
You fell in love with it? Atlanta?
Dr. Okoro (07:59):
Yes.
Eva Sheie (08:00):
Yes.
Dr. Okoro (08:00):
Yeah. You got to be ATL. Everybody knows somebody in ATL and if you don't, you know me now. Yeah. So from there I joined the Navy. I served 12 years total in the US Navy.
Eva Sheie (08:16):
There must have been a reason for you at that point to say, I'm going to join the Navy. That's not something that most people do.
Dr. Okoro (08:22):
No, no. So the truth of the matter is when I finished medical school, they approached me. They were looking for, the Navy always picks the best doctors because you have to be able to take care of the Marines on the go, great medicine, anytime, anywhere, right. So they approached me because I had 4.0 in medical school. Of course, they give you all the benefit of joining the Navy as a young medical student, I love what they were offering, including the possibility of doing away with my student loans. So I joined, it was a great course I joined. So I believed in what they're doing. So throughout my residency at Emory, I did military stuff and it really helped me become a good person. I was a good person, but a mature person, I should say mature. It helped me mature, traveled a lot. And when I finished that, I joined the Navy as a general surgeon.
(09:28):
So I wanted to be a plastic surgeon, but that's my original contract was as a general surgeon. So they wouldn't let me go into plastic surgery. So I had to fight and ask for it, begged them every day for four years. And the for year in practice as a general surgeon in the Navy, they allowed me to go and seek plastic surgery training. So I did. I left general surgery and went to plastic surgery at University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio. Love San Antonio, awesome people there. Made a lot of friends there. When I finished San Antonio and went back into the navy of plastic surgeon, we were all during the war through the whole thing. So I did a lot of war. I'm actually a war veteran, if you mind, people probably going to see me that way. But I did. And then after that I came back to Atlanta and opened up our practice Georgia Plastics in 2010. So that is the story. And of course my wife was with me throughout the whole journey from medical school. We got married in medical school.So actually she went to medical school with me training in the Navy and Georgia pastor. So don't ask me how many years, but I think it's over 30.
Eva Sheie (10:39):
Oh my goodness.
Dr. Okoro (10:40):
Yeah, we married over 30 years. Four kids. Yeah, four adult kids
Eva Sheie (10:46):
And no grandkids yet.
Dr. Okoro (10:48):
No, I don't have grandkids, but I think I'm too young for that.
Eva Sheie (10:51):
Oh, definitely.
Dr. Okoro (10:52):
Yeah. I don't look like that. I cannot look like a grandpa yet. There's no way. Yeah. I told him to wait for a minute. Maybe when I get to my sixties.
Eva Sheie (11:01):
Okay.
Dr. Okoro (11:01):
Yeah. So
Eva Sheie (11:02):
Next time you're on the podcast, I'll ask again.
Dr. Okoro (11:04):
I will.
Eva Sheie (11:10):
So is there anything you're looking forward to this year coming up?
Dr. Okoro (11:15):
Not really. I mean, I love where we are right now. We are growing. We are looking for another plastic surgeon to join our practice. We are finally expanding back to Atlanta, applied proper. We are in Marietta right now. Our main office is in Marietta with the mothership. But we have so many patients coming from Atlanta. I feel like we can serve them even better if we have an office in Atlanta.
Eva Sheie (11:42):
Yeah, that's exciting.
Dr. Okoro (11:43):
Yeah. We are growing into Atlanta again and we're looking for somebody to help us grow. And
Eva Sheie (11:48):
Do you have your own surgery center?
Dr. Okoro (11:50):
We have our own surgery center. We have a 14,000 square foot building the practice on the second floor, the surgery center and the med spa on the first floor. So we've occupied the whole building.
Eva Sheie (12:02):
Wow.
Dr. Okoro (12:02):
So it's a one-stop shop for everything. I mean, when people come to our practice, they don't need to go anywhere. We offer pretty much what people would need to make themselves feel comfortable.
Eva Sheie (12:15):
If someone's listening today and they want to find out more about your practice or the Med Spa, where should they go?
Dr. Okoro (12:21):
For the practice, Georgia Plastic, Georgia plastic.com. They check us on social media and hashtag Georgia plastic. The med spa is Amachi me Spa, A-M-A-C-H-I medspa.com.
Eva Sheie (12:36):
I've always wondered what that word means.
Dr. Okoro (12:38):
Wow. So the name comes from the names of my daughter. First name Amachi. My first daughter is Amanda, and my second daughter is Chichi
Eva Sheie (12:50):
Chichi?
Dr. Okoro (12:51):
Yes.
Eva Sheie (12:53):
And is she personality wise at Chichi?
Dr. Okoro (12:56):
Yes. She plays soccer. She plays soccer. She wants to be a plastic surgeon.
Eva Sheie (13:03):
Oh.
Dr. Okoro (13:04):
Yeah. And one for four.
Eva Sheie (13:09):
You have four girls?
Dr. Okoro (13:11):
No. Two boys and two girls.
Eva Sheie (13:12):
Oh, perfect.
Dr. Okoro (13:13):
Yeah. But it's
Eva Sheie (13:14):
Very balanced.
Dr. Okoro (13:14):
She's the last one. She's the only one that wants to go into medicine. But the spa is named after the girls.
Eva Sheie (13:21):
The mystery is solved.
Dr. Okoro (13:23):
Yes, yes.
Eva Sheie (13:24):
I looked at that years ago and I thought, what language is that?
Dr. Okoro (13:28):
It's Nigerian actually. It means the place of God.
Eva Sheie (13:32):
It does?
Dr. Okoro (13:33):
If you put it together Amachi, place of God.
Eva Sheie (13:36):
I love that.
Dr. Okoro (13:37):
That's actually wha itt means. But it comes from the first few letters of their name. I put it together and it means something in my language is place of God. So
Eva Sheie (13:47):
Even better.
Dr. Okoro (13:48):
Yeah. We only hire good people there. The team there, Majida, MJ, she's amazing. And she has a great team and most of them has been there for a long time. MJ has with us for 13 years this year. Yeah.
Eva Sheie (14:07):
Well, I know it's a special place. It's been fun to watch you grow so quickly and be so successful.
Dr. Okoro (14:13):
Thank you. Thank you.
Eva Sheie (14:15):
Thank you for joining us today.
Dr. Okoro (14:16):
Thank you, Eva. Good to see you again.
Eva Sheie (14:19):
You too.
Dr. Okoro (14:19):
Bye.
Eva Sheie (14:23):
If you are considering making an appointment or are on your way to meet this doctor, be sure to let them know you heard them on the Meet the Doctor podcast. Check the show notes for links, including the doctor's website and Instagram to learn more. Are you a doctor or do you know a doctor who'd like to be on the Meet the Doctor podcast? Book your free recording session at Meet the Doctor podcast.com. Meet the Doctor is Made with Love in Austin, Texas and is a production of The Axis T-H-E-A-X-I-S.io.
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