On 7th February last year, Sara Platt, 33, flew to Antalya, Turkey for a tummy tuck, a breast lift and augmentation. Cosmetic tourism is booming and she is one of a growing number of people risking their lives by travelling abroad for surgery. “I researched it for 17 months," she says. "I flew out to meet the surgeon a year beforehand. I saw his certificates, I read all the reviews. Turns out, it was all fake. The surgeon totally butchered me.”
She's not alone. Only two days ago, Morgan Ribeiro, 20, died after flying out to Turkey for a gastric band operation. She had been bullied for years about her weight but never made it home after an infection caused a heart attack. Earlier this month, Demi Agoglia, a 26-year-old British mother-of-three who had a Brazilian bum-lift operation in Turkey, died just days later from a cardiac arrest caused by a fat embolism. In November last year, Melissa Kerr, 31, also died of a fatal clot after the same procedure, also in Turkey.
Over the past decade, Turkey has become a major cosmetic tourism hotspot. In 2022, the International Society of Aesthetic Plastic Surgery ranked Turkey among the countries seeing the highest proportion of foreign patients. According to data compiled by the British Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons (BAAPS), since November last year, 78% of the corrective operations carried out in the UK have been on people who had aesthetic procedures in Turkey.
However, it isn’t the only common cosmetic tourism destination. Between 2018- 2022 alone, 324 patients required surgery once they returned home from countries abroad including the Czech Republic and Lithuania, as well as Turkey. In some cases, patients have needed intensive care treatment and several emergency operations.
The consultation process here vs abroad
“People are lured in with a variety of selling processes that would be considered unethical,” says Mr Marc Pacifico, BAAPS President. “These include time-pressured offers, buy-one-surgery-get-another-half-price deals, and advertising that glamorises the experience. It’s so deceitful.”
A quick Google search returns a number of enticing holiday packages that include a little nip and tuck. One company is offering a ‘Take The Girls’ package, inclusive of business flights and a 5* hotel suite for “a luxurious holiday with your girlfriends when you need a pick-me-up”. The itinerary for day one? Major abdominal surgery.
Many of the consultations with private clinics take place over WhatsApp or social media, rather than face-to-face. The consent process in the UK is rigorous by comparison. There is an initial ‘cooling off period’ of at least two weeks after the first consultation, and then the surgeon and patient work together to build an understanding of the risks and what can be achieved to make sure it’s in the patient’s best interest.
As a result of this multi-stage consent process, only a fraction of consultations result in surgery. “It's not like buying a new computer or car where you go in and say I’d like one of those, here's the money,” says Mr Pacifico. “Surgery is not a commodity. We're doctors first, and plastic surgeons second, and just because someone may come in asking for a particular procedure, or have a concern about particular parts of the body, doesn't obligate us or guarantee that they're going to get what they’re considering. It might not be suitable, whether that's for medical, physical or psychological reasons.”
Sara's experience of cosmetic surgery abroad
Magic Touch, the cosmetic agency Sara ended up booking through, is based in Antalya, Turkey. According to her, “they make it sound like you’ll have a boob job and spend the next few days sitting by the pool with a cocktail,” she recalls. “But it’s not like that. You’re alone in a hotel room, in my case, fighting for your life.”
She was collected from the airport by a smartly-dressed chauffeur and taken to her hotel. However, alarm bells soon started ringing. “They took me to a public women’s health hospital, which wasn’t what they advertised. They made me sign lots of documents I couldn’t read because they were in Turkish. When I hesitated, they rushed me saying that I was going to miss my slot and have to pay another £2000.
“I was taken into the theatre and made to sit on a metal board,” she continues. "I looked over and saw a woman having a caesarean section in the next room. I remember thinking “this isn’t right” but before I could say anything, I was asleep.”
After a 13-hour operation that was meant to take eight hours, Sara woke up screaming in pain. “My whole body was shaking. I tried to move my arms and that’s when I realised, he’d done surgery on my arms and a 360 degree upper body lift as well as the surgery that was planned for that day.”
Sara spent the next two weeks after her surgery between the hospital and a hotel room in unimaginable agony. “They didn’t change my dressings for nine days," she recalls. "They were sodden and I could smell rotting flesh. Eventually my husband took them off my stomach and this brown sludge gushed out and there was a huge hole. When he removed the dressing from my breasts, the swelling had popped the stitches open and there was green fluid coming out.”
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She was rushed in for further surgery – but this time, the surgeon did it in his consultation room, not at the hospital. And Sara was awake for the whole procedure with only local anaesthetic administered, while being held down by two assistants.
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“I could feel him cutting into me and then he started using a burning tool to cauterise the wounds. I could see the smoke coming off and smell my flesh burning. It was the most barbaric and traumatising thing I’ve ever been through.”
A few days later, the clinic refused to issue a Fit To Fly form (a medical certificate needed for air travel) unless Sara wrote them a positive review, which she did. “It was like a hostage situation,” she recalls.
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When she eventually got back to the UK, Sara received nine life-saving surgeries in a specialist NHS hospital. She had a severe infection caused by a multi-drug resistant bacteria, most likely from improperly sterilised surgical equipment and unsanitary environments, and had to spend weeks in isolation away from everyone, including her children.
Plus, the flesh on her breast and abdomen had started to die as a result of a severed blood supply and needed to be removed before it spread to surrounding healthy tissue.
She had a mastectomy of her right breast as well as the removal of a large area of her upper abdomen, which required skin grafts. Even now, she will need further surgeries to treat scar tissue adhesions in her bowel and to close a hole in her stomach, as well as breast reconstruction and other corrections.
When Sara got home eight weeks later, her mental health started to decline and she began to have nightmares and hallucinations. “Four days later, psychosis set in," she says. "I couldn’t remember anything, even my children’s names. I was sectioned and admitted to a mental health unit for a week. It was like my brain shut down due to the trauma of what had happened.”
So why is cosmetic tourism booming?
With so many horror stories, it might be hard to understand why there is so much interest in surgery abroad. Perhaps the biggest draw is that these destinations are offering surgery at a fraction of the price compared to the UK. In some cases, procedures are up to 50% cheaper.
“It might look cheaper initially, but when you factor in the aftercare beyond the initial week, the hotel bills, the flights, medication and any corrective surgery or follow up treatment needed, the true cost can be much, much higher,” explains Mr Richard Price, consultant plastic and cosmetic surgeon in Cambridge. It's also worth noting that your insurance may not cover travelling home in an emergency if something goes wrong.
While life-saving treatment is covered on the NHS, any reconstructive or corrective surgery will need to be paid for privately. In Sara’s case, she has been quoted £20,000 for a breast reconstruction and the other corrections needed to treat her disfigurements, which is on top of the £15,000 she paid for the original surgery in Turkey.
“Most people decide to go abroad because of the price and because they are not able to afford the same procedure in the UK,” says Mr Pacifico. “When it doesn't work out well for them, they really don't have the money that is required for what is often quite expensive and complex restorative or reconstructive surgery. They feel guilty, they feel angry, and they feel cheated.”
There is also the promise of enjoying a sun-filled holiday and working on your tan while you recover. When in reality you need to avoid swimming, lying in the sun and drinking alcohol.
Is it safe to go abroad for cosmetic surgery?
No surgery is risk-free and, of course, complications can happen in the UK or abroad. It's also important to note that there are good surgeons in the Czech Republic, Lithuania and Turkey, as well as bad ones. But it's important to do your research if you're considering cosmetic surgery abroad and weigh up the potential risks against the money you may be saving.
In 2018 the Turkish health ministry imposed regulations requiring clinics that treat international patients to go through a licensing procedure. However, the medical tourism industry is not internationally regulated, so training requirements differ and those countries, which are not part of the EU, do not comply with the same guidelines as surgeons and hospitals in the UK.
By comparison, there are stringent regulations in place for plastic surgery in the UK. Only doctors or surgeons registered with the General Medical Council can perform these surgeries – you can check the register here. Some surgeons have a cosmetic surgery certificate from the Royal College of Surgeons, which means they have been assessed and meet a national standard. Many surgeons are also members of professional bodies such as the BAAPS, which make sure they have the relevant qualifications and insurance to perform specific types of surgery.
Part of the reason UK prices are higher is that they include comprehensive aftercare. “There is an absolute expectation that surgeons own their complications and will continue to treat a patient until they are well,” explains Mr Price.
Some providers will also cover cosmetic dissatisfaction if the surgeon and patient agree that the results fall short of what could have been achieved. For surgery abroad, package deals tend to only include one week of aftercare, after which point, patients are on their own.
Not to mention, it can be dangerous to fly immediately after surgery as you increase the risk of developing deep vein thrombosis or a pulmonary embolism. In fact, according to the NHS, which has a helpful page of advice on its website, you should wait five to seven days after breast surgery and liposuction before flying; it's as much as 10 days after facial cosmetic procedures or tummy tucks.
As more reports of the risks and complications of cosmetic tourism come to light, more is being done to try to protect and inform people. BAAPS has issued a list of guidelines for anyone considering plastic surgery abroad, which includes things like checking the aftercare arrangements, and seeing a copy of the surgeon’s indemnity certificate.
BAAPS is also in discussion with the Advertising Standards Authority to address the misleading adverts as well as the Turkish Society of Plastic, Reconstructive and Aesthetic Surgeons (TSPRAS) to draw up some advice and guidance specifically for patients seeking surgery in Turkey.
These include advice to check that your Turkish surgeon is a member of TSPRAS (the Turkish Society of Plastic Reconstructive and Aesthetic Surgeons) – there is a member listing available online. They should also have Turkish board certification.
As for Sara, she’s committed to warning as many people as possible against cosmetic tourism abroad: “It really is like playing Russian Roulette. If I can prevent just one person from going through what I did, laying myself bare will be worth it.”
GLAMOUR UK contacted Magic Touch Turkey and Aesthetica for comment.
Magic Touch Turkey responded:
“We would like to reiterate that we have obtained all the necessary and legally mandated documents, approvals, and consent forms from every patient Magic Touch introduces to the health experts before any procedures were performed. We have also thoroughly informed all patients about all the processes involved, serving as intermediaries between the health entity and the patient. It is important to understand that we are not a hospital or a doctor; we are an independent entity that facilitates connections between patients and qualified health providers.”
