Dr. Michelle Lee

Dr. Michelle Lee founded PERK Plastic Surgery and is a board-certified plastic surgeon, certified by the American Board of Plastic Surgery since November 2017. She started as a plastic surgeon at DuPage Medical Group in September 2016 and has practiced at PERK since December 2018. From March 2019 to 2024 she served as Medical Director at Skin by Lovely Facial Aesthetics. Her medical licenses include Illinois since 2016, California since 2018, and Massachusetts from 2015 to 2016. She trained at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, where she earned a Doctor of Medicine in 2009 on a merit scholarship. Her residency in integrated plastic and reconstructive surgery was at Case Western Reserve University from 2009 to 2015, followed by a microsurgery clinical fellowship at Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital, Harvard Medical School, from 2015 to 2016. She also holds a bachelor of arts in music (piano performance) and English literature from UCLA, earned between 2000 and 2004. Before medicine, she performed as a concert pianist internationally for about a decade. Her surgical practice centers on facial rejuvenation, including facelifts, neck lifts, deep plane facelifts, facial fat grafting, eyelid surgery and brow lift. She also performs breast surgery, cosmetic surgery for men such as gynecomastia correction and eyelid surgery, and body contouring. She was the first surgeon in Illinois to use AirXpanders for tissue expansion during breast reconstruction. She has published more than 20 peer-reviewed papers, including a 2012 case report on breast implant-associated anaplastic large cell lymphoma in The Lancet. She sits on the editorial board of Aesthetic Plastic Surgery Journal and on a breast and aesthetics committee for the American Society of Plastic Surgeons. In 2025 she was visiting professor at Cleveland Clinic and delivered its 7th Annual MetroHealth Earle-Jordan Endowed Lectureship. She has been a Castle Connolly Top Doctor since 2022 and was named to Newsweek's America's Best Plastic Surgeons for Facelift in 2026. Patients travel from around the world, and she provides care from consultation through recovery.