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'Dr Pimple Popper': Will Dennis be able to get rid of bumps on his head that looked like 'ticking atom bombs'?

He was unable to sleep at night because the bumps come in the way. His helmet didn’t fit anymore stopping him from doing what he loved doing the most — riding his motorcycle

On the January 10 episode of ‘Dr Pimple Popper’, we met 67-year-old Dennis who had a huge bump on the back of his head and three smaller bumps around it.

He has had the bumps for six years now and they have made his life very difficult. He was unable to sleep at night because the bumps come in the way. His helmet didn’t fit anymore stopping him from doing what he loved doing the most — riding his motorcycle.

His wife Donna, his biggest advocate, coaxed him into seeing Dr Sandra Lee. Dennis is skeptical of doctors due to a bad experience in the past. He confessed that doctors and hospitals give him anxiety. 

When Dr Lee met them she revealed she had interacted with them during quarantine on video conference and was looking forward to meeting the sweet couple in person. After taking a closer look at the bump which Dr Lee admitted looked bigger in person, she was very confused. She confessed she doesn’t know what it was but it looked like “ticking atom bombs”. She also said, “If it’s a pilar cyst, it’s the biggest pilar cyst I have ever seen.”

As she began the surgery, she knew it was not going to be easy as it caused a lot of bleeding. She was, however, able to take out the entire chunk of the big lump without breaking it. Dr Lee advised Dennis to come back another day for the rest of the lumps on his head as the big one caused a lot of bleeding. When Dr Lee popped the 2-pound cyst, golden liquid oozed out of it that almost filled the container it was in.

Dennis, while he was happy that he got rid of the biggest one, couldn’t wait to get rid of all the lumps and live a normal life. He came back the next day and Dr Lee got to work. The tricky part was each of his cysts was very different from the other and almost all were stuck to his head. Dr Lee slowly and patiently took them out and very soon Dennis was lump-free.

According to Mamma Mia!, an extraction session could cost $500 to $600. That’s a lot of money, but that’s because of a specific reason. “A lot of these people really want these things to be removed,” Dr Lee told Forbes. “They’re benign and they’re not anything that needs to be removed medically, which is why insurance won’t pay.”

The dermatologist went on to explain how she used this to her advantage. “So, many dermatologists we won’t remove them, they say, ‘You have a blackhead there but don’t worry about it’. But now, I’ll do the extractions for free if my patients let me videotape and use the video,” Dr Lee told Forbes. “Of course, I make them anonymous and remove anything identifying.” That way people were happy to get free treatment and she had the footage.

In the end, a consultation with Dr Sandra Lee costs $120 and that fee reportedly can go toward the price of the extraction session. Extraction sessions then cost between $500 to $600. People in her videos usually don’t have to pay for the fee, but regular patients will because it’s not covered by insurance.

Catch new episodes of 'Dr Pimple Popper’ on Mondays at 9 pm ET/PT.