First, I am not one to tarnish someone’s name in any way or leave a bad review. I honestly feel bad exposing this, but I feel as if I should warn everyone considering this physician, as my treatment I received was unacceptable. Dr. Oliva tried to take a cyst out of my ear last fall. He did not remove it in its entirety and also did not stitch it up correctly, literally leaving a hole in my earlobe. I went back after one week, and he said to “leave some tape on it.” The scar was atrocious, I looked as if I had a piercing gone wrong; a 1mm diameter red depressed circular scar in my ear. The cyst came back a month or so after surgery and was larger than ever. Thanks to Dr. Oliva’s poor surgical technique, I required a revision surgery on an area filled with scar tissue and a free fluid sarcoma. I went to Dr. Decker in Saranac Lake, who thankfully and successfully removed the cyst this time with no return, (albeit it was a much more serious surgery than before) and performed a scar excision and transfer flap to hide Dr. Oliva’s work, placing a new scar in my ear crease where it is not visible. After doing some research, I found that I am not the only patient who has received bad treatment from this physician. There are malpractice suits of him performing botched jaw surgery when he was a resident, and cutting a patient open for the incorrect hand surgery procedure, which led him to a board sanction. Don’t be fooled by some of the positive reviews of him, if Dr. Oliva screwed up on a simple cyst excision I would not trust him with anything.