Three young mothers under the age of 40 are dead because they wanted to be beautiful. Kellee Lee-Howard wanted a slimmer body. Ditto Maria Shortall and Rohie Kah-Orukatan. Shortall worked as a housekeeper; Lee-Howard was the mother of six kids and Kah-Orukotan died at the same place where she received manicures. What do these women have in common besides being minorities? They had liposuction procedures performed by men who offered a discounted price for an elective surgical procedure. These men professed to be competent in performing the procedures but never had accredited training.
I knew this day was coming. I saw the storm long before the clouds emerged. As the insurance payments for professional medical services decreased and declined, physicians began to look for alternative ways to earn money. But was it ethical? Gynecologists began to do liposuctions. General surgeons did breast augmentations. Some primary care physicians abandoned seeing patients altogether and opted to do chemical peels and weight loss treatments. Medical spas were added to traditional medical practices. Everyone wanted to cash in on a woman’s desire to be beautiful. Physicians were now business owners and entrepreneurs. However, could they attend a weekend seminar and returns to their offices on Monday ready to do the procedures? Were they really as competent as a plastic surgeon who had five years of training?
Jayne O’Donnell recently published an expose about these doctors in USA Today entitled Lack of Training in Cosmetic Surgery Can Be Deadly. It reads like a litany of horror. The physician who performed Kah-Orukotan’s liposuction was an occupational health physician. He didn’t have the proper equipment in his office nor was the procedure approved for office surgery. Shortall and Lee-Howard’s physician did an internship in pediatrics, another internship and residency in general surgery but never got board certified in the 27 years that he has practiced medicine. Had these ladies accessed the Florida Board of Medicine website and looked up their physician, they would have noted the $350,000 settlement in 2004. They would have also noted the absence of board certification, the absence of plastic surgical training and the absence of privileges to admit to a hospital.
All three women died from complications of anesthesia. They had received too much lidocaine which is a numbing medicine given by injection prior to a surgical procedure. Too much lidocaine can also stop the heart. These deaths should have never happened.
Linda Burke-Galloway is an obstetrician-gynecologist and author of The Smart Mother’s Guide to a Better Pregnancy. She blogs at her self-titled site, Dr. Linda Burke-Galloway.
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