For the love of beauty, I started cosmetic clinic

Dr Pranav Pancholi is a Kenyan Cosmetic Dermatosurgeon [PHOTO: JENNIFER WACHIE/STANDARD]

NAIROBI, KENYA: Upon leaving university, graduates can choose to seek employment or take the road to self-employment.

Pranav Pancholi, a medical doctor, chose the latter. In 2008, he set up Avane cosmetic clinic, one of the first health facilities of its kind in Kenya.

Dr Pancholi recalls his classmates angling to get employed in the public sector after graduating in 2004.

He, on the other hand, had different ideas in mind. “There was a huge gap in aesthetic medicine. My decision to startAvane was purely driven by the realisation that there were many Kenyans who needed professional cosmetic services, and absence of professionals who could do the job,” says DR Pancholi.

As a University of Nairobi student, Pancholi trained at Kenyatta National Hospital. After graduation, he was posted to Thika District hospital where he practiced for a short while before travelling to the UK for further studies.

There, he completed a postgraduate diploma in dermatology at the University of Cardiff and later acquired a Master of Medicine degree in skin cancer surgery from the University of Queensland.

“My father is a dermatologist. On many occasions I visited him at the hospital and saw him treat patients with skin problems. I always loved how he did it,” says the doctor.

When average Kenyans hear the term ‘medical doctor’ most will imagine the man or woman treating patients for conditions that could easily turn fatal.

Pancholi, however, felt more drawn to the plight of people who had insecurities stemming from their looks.

“I was bullied myself because I did not have the looks when I was younger,” he says. “I badly wanted to be accepted among my peers yet not many people wanted to be friends with me. I couldn’t have a girlfriend.”

Being shunned by peers, he says, made him a bookworm. Books provided him with an escape from the reality of not having friends. It is only after going to medical school that Pancholi understood just how much physical appearance matters in many aspects of life.

“Like it or not, studies have proven that beautiful and good looking people have a better chance of getting a job. They are likely to be paid more, they will marry a richer (or equally good-looking spouse), they are better at sales or marketing, they are used on advertisements and their chances at success are much higher.” For this reason Pancholi, unlike his father, decided to go into private practice: cobbling together the idea to start a cosmetic clinic and starting off from the fourth floor of Yaya Centre.

Like many start-ups Avane rolled off with a simple desk, a book and a pen as well as simple medical tools like the stethoscope. The initial capital, about Sh500, 000 came from a bank loan.

Avane primarily offered laser-based procedures and in some cases minimally invasive surgery.

Later, in 2009, Pancholi was accepted to a Fellowship program in Dermatology at Harvard University. Upon coming back to Kenya, he rolled out a range of procedures to address beautyproblems – “the challenges of being physically unattractive,” he says.

Running the cosmetic clinic, he says, did not require a lot of marketing as patients readily showed up as referrals ramped up.

Plus, when his services began featuring in public conversations, he found himself on Kenyan TV stations, discussing the somewhat taboo subject of ‘good looks’.

“Majority of the patients who come to Avane for cosmetic procedures would not want it known. That is because they fear that society is not fully open about cosmetic procedures,” he says. “But they still come because it is only themselves who know how it feels to possess a hideous feature on their bodies. They want it fixed.”

Today, 10 years on, Avane receives hundreds of patients every week. Majority of them want to shed some years off their faces.

Do you know any prominent Kenyans – celebrities or politicians – who look younger than they actually are?

“These patients get treatments like Botox and dermal fillers – to get rid of wrinkles and to firm the skin,” explains Pancholi.

Other patients want to get rid of love handles as well as saggy flesh in the stomach and thigh areas; not forgetting post-motherhood stretch marks.

The catalogue of procedures offered at Avane clinics is much larger though. They include weight loss and body contouring, laser tattoo removal, vaginal rejuvenation (to improve vagina aesthetics), Femi lift (to firm muscles that support the bladder and address urine stress incontinence) as well as laser hair removal for patients with hirsutism or polycystic ovarian syndrome.

Riding on increasing numbers of patients over the years Avane now operates two more clinics in Kenya, one in Mombasa and another at Parklands Avenue in Nairobi.

The clinic has further opened subsidiaries in Kampala, Uganda, and Arusha, Tanzania.

For Pancholi, Avane is not merely a cosmetic clinic: it is the place where patients boost their self-esteem and become more hopeful about their prospects in life.