There is a version of a successful facial plastic surgery career that stays entirely within a private clinic, serving patients who can pay and building a reputation on technical results. Dr. Andrew Jacono built that career and then consistently extended it outward, applying the same surgical skills to people whose faces had been damaged by violence, poverty, or accidents of birth in places where care was not available.
Dr. Andrew Jacono, dual board-certified in facial plastic surgery, has treated more than 850 patients through charitable work across domestic violence programs and international missions, numbers that represent a consistent commitment sustained across more than two decades of practice in New York.
Reconstructing Survivors of Violence
The FACE TO FACE program, administered by the American Academy of Facial Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, connects domestic violence survivors with surgeons willing to contribute pro bono care. Dr. Andrew Jacono has served as the program’s senior advisor and has personally performed reconstructive surgeries for more than 100 survivors. The physical injuries these patients carry broken bones, deep scarring, tissue damage are often the direct result of abuse that occurred months or years earlier.
Facial trauma from violence creates consequences that extend well past the initial injury. Survivors may struggle with the psychological weight of seeing their trauma reflected in the mirror. Disfigurement can affect employment prospects, social relationships, and the ability to fully separate from abusive contexts. Reconstructive surgery addresses that burden directly.
The documentary series Facing Trauma, which premiered in 2011 and aired on both Discovery Fit & Health and the Oprah Winfrey Network, followed Dr. Jacono through this work, offering a detailed look at the intersection of surgical medicine and social recovery. He also chaired ABOUT FACE: MAKING CHANGES for nine years and received recognition from the Center for the Women of New York and U.S. Congresswoman Carolyn McCarthy.
Global Missions for Pediatric Patients
Dr. Andrew Jacono conducts approximately two international surgical missions per year, working with Healing the Children, the HUGS Foundation, and THAI Children in countries across Latin America and Southeast Asia. The more than 750 children he has treated through these missions present with cleft lips and palates, ear deformities, facial tumors, and burn injuries conditions that determine access to education and community life in regions where surgical specialists rarely reach.
Mount Kilimanjaro, Cotopaxi, and Mount Elbrus have all served as stages for Dr. Jacono’s fundraising efforts on behalf of mission costs. His teaching roles at Albert Einstein College of Medicine and as Fellowship Director for the AAFPRS mean the philosophy that drives his own career is now part of what he conveys to surgeons he trains a continuity built from the moment in medical school when he first saw what surgery could do for a child who had been shut out of ordinary life. Read this article for related information.
Related information about Dr. Andrew Jacono can be found on https://goodmenproject.com/everyday-life-2/dr-andrew-jacono-on-the-rising-demand-of-male-facelifts/