Living For Giving

When people started calling Dr. Anthony Dardano “the dancing doctor” six years ago, it didn’t bother him.

He was an avid participant in Boca’s Ballroom Battle 2013 to raise money for the George Snow Scholarship Fund.

“I don’t mind putting myself out there for charity,” he says. “I actually got out there and put on a funny outfit and danced for money. I went the extra mile.”

Last October, to benefit the Unicorn Children’s Foundation, Dr. Dardano dressed in drag and performed at Lips in Fort Lauderdale, taking home the title Queen of the Night.

Such actions are typical of this renowned plastic and reconstructive surgeon based in Boca Raton, who is almost as well known for his philanthropic work as for his surgical practice.

Most of Dr. Dardano’s medical work is done at Boca Raton Regional Hospital and Delray Medical Center, and he has held many hospital appointments and committee chairmanships at both institutions. 

Oddly enough, he didn’t start out in plastic surgery. His first training was in trauma surgery, where he noticed how often plastic surgeons were called in to assist. That inspired him to train in both plastic and reconstructive surgery.

“Some other specialties are limited,” he says. “But, as a plastic surgeon, I can operate on men and women, adults and children, and all parts of the body. It makes everything interesting because I can do something different every day.”

He adds that plastic surgeons are a special breed: “We are often called the ‘surgeon’s surgeon.’ When another doctor gets into trouble, he usually calls in a plastic surgeon.” 

In his private practice, Dr. Dardano uses the latest techniques, and he also continues to publish clinical research. But, at the same time, he’s happily settled in downtown Boca, where he lives – and is visited frequently by his three adult sons.

Any additional time he has is spent participating in medical missions, which have taken him to El Salvador, Nepaland Haiti.  

Of his profession as a whole, Dr. Dardano says that he enjoys its transformative nature best: “Changing someone’s life either for an aesthetic reason or for reconstruction after a traumatic injury, that involves reshaping or making new again – and, in the end, bringing the patient’s spirits back again.” O