Software engineers are paying $70K to get 3 inches taller, says plastic surgeon

A cosmetic surgeon who specializes in lengthening legs said he can add 3 to 6 inches to a person’s height, but it comes at a hefty price.

Dr. Kevin Debiparshad, or “Dr. D,” one of the only handful of surgeons in North America who will perform cosmetic leg lengthening, told GQ that each procedure runs from $70,000 to $150,000, depending on how many inches the patient wants to gain.

He said business at LimbplastX Institute in Las Vegas, which he founded in 2016, has boomed during the pandemic. Since the beginning of lockdowns, Debiparshad said the institute has been seeing twice its normal number of patients – sometimes as many as 50 new people per month.

And many of them are “tech bros” – software developers at some of America’s largest companies.  

“I joke that I could open a tech company,” says Dr D.

“I got, like, 20 software engineers doing this procedure right now who are here in Vegas. There was a girl yesterday from PayPal. I’ve got patients from Google, Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft. I’ve had multiple patients from Microsoft.”

GQ writer Chris Gayomali uses terms like “agonizing” and “really f--king gnarly” to describe the procedure, which begins with the breaking of the patient’s femurs, or thigh bones. Adjustable titanium nails are inserted down the centers and extended one millimeter per day for about 90 days via a magnetic remote control – slow enough to allow bones to grow around them.

Those who want more than three inches do the same to their shin bones.

Gayomali notes some drawbacks, like how the body’s proportions will be thrown off because all the length is gained in the legs. The recovery can also be long and difficult. He described the section of an unhealed leg felt as “a little soft, like al dente spaghetti.”

The leg extensions also stretch the muscles and nerves around the bones to their limits, which may necessitate painkillers for months. Patients may not be able to walk for weeks or even months.

Stigmas around cosmetic surgery are fading in the US, especially for men. The American Society of Plastic Surgeons reported than male cosmetic procedures were up 29% in 2019 compared to two decades prior.

“But male height, particularly the absence of it, is one of the last social stigmas, as if the new rules of body positivity fail to apply vertically,” wrote Gayomali, who reveals he is 5’ 6.”

“Short guys aren’t so much discriminated against as they are precluded from stuff: like dating certain taller people, or making your frosh-soph basketball team.”

Debiparshad doesn’t recommend leg lengthening for athletes though, saying “It’s hard to predict what the athletic outcome is going to be.”