The Englishwoman in Los Angeles

Dr. Wai-Yee Li is a female board-certified plastic surgeon based in Pasadena and Arcadia in Southern California. She specializes in aesthetic and reconstructive plastic surgery all over the body.

Her focus is providing the best surgical outcomes with less pain and minimal scarring. After thirty years of taking care of patients, Dr Li’s primary motivation to establish ‘LA Breast and Body’ was to offer patients the best possible surgical experience.

For many years she has heard her patients talk about feeling ‘intimidated’ and ‘embarrassed’ after seeing other plastic surgeons. Her all-female practice is a comfortable space for all patients (male and female) to be seen and heard, as well as get the best surgery they need and/or desire.

The surgeon who thinks outside the box

Dr Li performs all types of plastic surgery procedures, but her special focus is on complex breast and abdominal reconstruction and esthetics. She has restored many challenging patients who were left with poor esthetic results and discomfort by other surgeons.

Many of these patients travel far distances to get Dr Li’s expert advice and recommendations, after being referred by friends, family and other surgeons. She has also performed numerous oncoplastic and regular breast reductions, gynecomastia excision, mastopexies (breast lift), breast augmentations, direct-to-implant (DTI) after mastectomy, Goldilocks procedure, aesthetic flat closure and latissimus dorsi myocutaneous flap.

She ‘invented’ the ‘Combined Bra-Line Back-Lift Latissimus flap’ (BLBL-LAT) procedure. This procedure not only allows a form of autologous breast reconstruction (using the patients’ own tissues) but, at the same time, improves the back ‘rolls’ that can form after weight gain and weight loss, as well as aging. She has been applauded by her refinement and resurrection of the traditional latissimus dorsi flap, making it an overnight stay for most patients, with minimal post-surgery pain and excellent cosmetic outcomes.

This can be an excellent form of reconstruction even after radiation. In 2024, after a decade of clinical research, she published her work on the BLBL-LAT flap in two prestigious plastic surgery journals, Plastic Reconstructive Surgery Journal GO and the Aesthetic Surgery Journal (1). Her innovative work was also selected for a podcast by PRS GO, first broadcast in June 2024. She also has extensive experience in complex reconstruction of the perineal region, the area ‘between the legs’, often restoring patients after advanced colorectal and gynecological cancers.

These have often included vaginal and vulval reconstruction, after cancer surgery, using the patient’s own tissues. Her outstanding skills and exemplary patient care made her the most sought-after plastic reconstructive surgeon by other surgeons at the top cancer institute she worked in for 10 years.

The enthusiastic educator

Dr Li has a passion for providing the best possible clinical experience, what she calls ‘the journey’, for all her patients. In 2023, she started her YouTube educational channel for patients to ‘empower women through education’, providing shorts and long form video content on breast cancer reconstruction. She has continued to teach patients through her outreach involvement in several breast cancer charities, where her sole purpose is to guide and support patients, including the Chinese Christian Herald Crusades, San Gabriel Valley, Living Beauty Cancer Foundation, Pasadena and the Cancer Support Community, Sierra Madre.

Her passion for teaching also extends to our future generation of surgeons. She has routinely welcomed a host of high school, college and medical students for observation. She also mentors residents training in general surgery and plastic surgery and is a volunteer faculty at Huntington Memorial Hospital, Pasadena, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, and University of California Riverside. 

An accomplished researcher

Dr Li has a basic science PhD in wound healing and facial development. During her 6 years of laboratory research, she studied and published her work on cell signaling in fetal and keloid scars, as well as creating a model for cleft lip. Clinically, she has built upon her scientific knowledge and performed numerous scar revisions and healed difficult wounds.

In addition to her numerous peer-reviewed publications and book chapters, she is frequently invited to present her work at national and international conferences. Her work has been presented in many countries, including England, Scotland, USA, Singapore, Hong Kong, Japan and China. She is a member of the Aesthetic Society, the premier esthetic society in the USA, and serves as a reviewer for their official publication, the Aesthetic Surgery Journal.

She is also reviewer to the Hand journal, BMJ case reports and Annals of Plastic Surgery Journal. She is also a member of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (since 2008), a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons (FACS) and was also a member of the Royal College of Surgeons of England (MRCS Eng), prior to moving to the USA.

International Training spanning three countries

Born and raised in London, England, Dr. Li is of Chinese origin and is fluent in Hak Kar, Cantonese and learning mandarin. Many patients are pleasantly surprised by her British accent. She also studied French at high school and Japanese at Medical School. She earned her Bachelor of Science in Pathology, with honors, from the University of Birmingham Medical School, England, where she also completed her Bachelor of Medicine and Surgery. Following graduation from medical school, she first trained in internal medicine as an intern.  

She then embarked on her training in general surgery and cancer reconstruction at the world-renowned Royal Marsden Hospital, London, England, followed by plastic and reconstructive surgery training at the Queen Victoria Hospital, East Grinstead, England. This plastic surgery unit is one of the most historically important plastic surgery centers in Great Britain, due to the pioneering procedures developed there on injured airmen during World War 2. After her training there, Dr Li went on to pursue a Ph.D. in wound healing and craniofacial development, at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, granted by the University of Manchester, England. Her PhD was funded by a competitive joint fellowship by the American College of Surgeons and Royal College of Surgeons of England.

She then pursued her second (six-year) residency in plastic and reconstructive surgery at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, where she had extensive training from some of the most famous cosmetic surgeons in the USA, as well as established reconstructive plastic surgeons. This was followed by a craniofacial fellowship at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada. During her time at the British Columbia Childrens’ Hospital, she performed many different complex pediatric surgeries, including cranial vault remodeling (skull reshaping), cleft lip and palate repair and ear reconstructions.

The animal lover, classical musician, Chinese brush painter, and badminton player

Dr Li currently resides in Los Angeles with her husband and two daughters and their rescue cats and dog.  A trained classical violinist, she loves attending concerts and musicals with her family. She is also an avid gardener and landscape designer.  She enjoys Chinese brush painting, under the tutelage of her friend, teacher, internationally-exhibited artist and author, Nan Rae. A competitive mixed doubles badminton player at medical school, she has recently taken up pickleball.

Garment designer to Surgical Seecrets

As a child, Dr Li learned dressmaker from her mother, a seamstress. Using this background, she was able to make costumes for her competitor figure skating daughters. During the COVID pandemic, she drew upon these skills to start her post-surgical garment company, Surgical Seecrets, when she saw that her pelvic patients did not have comfortable underwear, allowing easy access for wound care.

She invented the ‘Seecret Undies’, a patent-pending one-piece underwear, that patients and nurses have described as ‘a gift’. She is currently designing a comfortable compressive breast binder for patients after breast surgery, flat closure and TOP surgery.