Liposuction at home = Death. A report out of Boston reveals that a Brazilian man and his wife were caught performing liposuction in the basement of a condominium after one of their patients died. Apparently, these two wackos were convincing people in the community to have liposuction by them, claiming that he was a plastic surgeon.
It is an utter shame that there are people in the community who mascarade as plastic surgeons and take advantage of naive patients in order to make money. While this story is shocking, unfortunately there are physicians in most large metropolitan areas who mascarade as Board-Certified Plastic Surgeons in order to convince them to pay for plastic surgery in their offices. Here, in the metro Detroit area, there is a worrisome trend toward businesspeople starting up cosmetic surgery practices where they hire doctors to perform surgeries on people at severely reduced prices. Unfortunately, these doctors are usually not real plastic surgeons, and often perform “hack jobs” on unsuspecting patients. They often call themselves “Cosmetic Surgeons,” which is a generic term for anyone who performs cosmetic surgery. The “cosmetic surgeon” could be a dermatologist, OB-Gyn, or even an ER doc. “Cosmetic surgeons” are not the same as “Plastic Surgeons.” If you have interest in this topic, check out Dr. Rob Oliver’s post on Plastic Surgery 101.
