“We are in shock. We can’t believe it”.
The family of Sara Gómez, a woman from 39 Years after he died on January 1 in Spain after undergoing cosmetic surgery, he is still trying to assimilate what happened.
It is not explained how Sara left the operating room with “injuries typical of a brawl with weapons” when presenting near 15 perforations between 0.5 and 2 centimeters in organs such as the kidneys, colon, intestine or liver, among others, denounced the first lawyer that the family of the deceased had.
“We want that the full weight of the law falls on the guilty because it was a carnage ”, Ezequiel Nicolás, ex-partner of the deceased and family spokesperson, tells BBC Mundo, who has already denounced for an alleged crime of reckless homicide both the surgeon who operated on Sara like the anesthetist.
On December 2, the woman, who was in good condition health, according to his family, he entered a private clinic in Cartagena, Murcia (southeast), to undergo liposculpture, an intervention in which fat is extracted through a cannula and then transferred to other parts of the body with the aim of remodeling the figure.
After five hours of operation, the surgeon assured Sara’s family that everything had gone well, although she was somewhat unstable. However, hours later the patient was transferred in an extremely serious situation – due to loss of blood and other liquids – to the hospital. There she remained admitted to the intensive care unit for almost a month, until she died on January 1.
The operation lasted longer than expected, it was performed between 9: 00 Y 14: 30 hours, and it was not until almost four hours later when the doctor called the emergency service, as reported in dialogue with BBC Mundo on first lawyer of the victim’s family, Ignacio Martínez.
“In the more than 15 For years that I have been treating this type of case I have seen everything, but this is the most incomprehensible to all”, assured the lawyer.
Reddish liquid
In the medical report of the hospital where Sara died, lesions are recorded as “necrosis of the wall abdominal, peritonitis, abscess so with intestinal content, dissection of the entire right and left retroperitoneum with exposure of both iliopsoas muscles, great swelling and gastrointestinal congestion with multiple perforations”.
The accused surgeon, of 14 years old and of Chilean nationality, he assures, according to his lawyer, that the operation was carried out without complications and this was also initially confirmed by the anesthesiologist.
However, twelve days after the intervention, the anesthetist made an appearance before the Health Department of the Murcia region and assured that he had warned the doctor that the patient was suffering from episodes of hypotension and that the liquid that was extracted had a dark color. hematic (reddish), when it is normal for it to be yellowish when it comes to fat.
The victim’s family’s lawyer tima argued that, on the one hand, there is “clear medical negligence” on the part of the surgeon “in having inserted the cannula into the peritoneum (the tissue that lines the abdominal wall and covers most of the organs in the abdomen) instead of having done it in the space between the skin and the muscle, which is where the fat is.”
On the other hand, he added, “It is not understood why they did not stop the operation when they saw that the extracted liquid was reddish in color, especially considering that the anesthetist had warned, or why they called the emergency services so late.”
The surgeon’s lawyer, Pablo Martínez, indicates, however, to BBC Mundo that his client did not detect any type of bleeding or any fact that would make him think that something was wrong during the operation, “because of having noticed something strange , I would have stopped the intervention”.
“It sold very well on social networks”
Sara, who was the mother of two children and had her own company as a real estate agent, had previously undergone other aesthetic operations. “She liked to take care of herself and look good,” says the family, who describes her as an athletic and family person who liked to travel and the sea.
According to Ezequiel Nicolás, Sara’s ex-partner, the doctor who had operated on her in 2019 after an abdominoplasty recommended that she not undergo liposculpture, but when she contacted the now accused doctor, he assured her that it was a simple operation and that she would be recovered in a few days. He paid for the intervention 5.700 euros (about US$6.60).
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Sara had known this surgeon for three years through friends they had in common and what encouraged her to undergo this new operation were the images of “all kinds of aesthetic operations” that this doctor showed on his Instagram. “It sold very well,” says Ezequiel.
The judge handling the case withdrew the surgeon’s passport, but he has not been removed from his profession, as the prosecution claimed, so that you can continue practicing.
Who can perform cosmetic surgeries in Spain?
Deaths in Cosmetic surgery like Sara’s is exceptional in Spain, but it is very common for this type of operation to be performed by doctors who lack specialization in the matter, as the law allows it.
Currently, any person with a degree in Medicine and who has completed a specialty in Surgery can carry out cosmetic, plastic or repair operations.
It is not necessary for a doctor in private healthcare to have an official degree in Plastic, Aesthetic and Reconstructive Surgery to perform this e type of interventions, while in the public they do require it.
The accused doctor is a cardiovascular surgeon and has a master’s degree in Aesthetic Medicine from a year of duration at the Complutense University of Madrid, his lawyer tells BBC Mundo, who assures that his client has been a collegiate since 2014 and has years of experience in aesthetic operations.
Sara’s case has fueled the demand for a legislative change in Spain so that only doctors who have studied this specialty.
“The problem is that there is no regulation adapted to social reality, we are governed by rules of 1958 (with some later modification). In private healthcare there are doctors who use misleading titles such as ‘cosmetic surgeon’ and that confuses patients, because they believe that a plastic surgeon is going to operate on them, ”explains Dr. José Luis Vila Moriente, president of the Spanish Society, to BBC Mundo. of Plastic, Reconstructive and Aesthetic Surgery (Secpre).
Silent victims
The Association of the Patient Ombudsman in Spain received between 2016 and 2020 a total of 32.32 complaints due to medical-sanitary negligence, which caused 3.717 deaths.
Of the 13.00 complaints made in 2021, 300 are cases arising from a plastic, restorative or aesthetic surgery intervention, although in reality they estimate that the number of victims “can rise up to 60.”.
“There are many people who do not report it out of fear or shame, because those closest to them do not know that they have undergone surgery and do not want to say so. That is why we estimate that the affected victims are many more than those that reach us, ”Carmen Flores, president of this group that has been advising people affected by medical-health negligence for more than two decades, explains to BBC Mundo.
Other times the victims cannot report because many doctors only accept cash and without a bill, since “there is not enough control”, laments the association, that calls for a legislative change from the government so that these operations are performed exclusively by specialized surgeons.
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