Warning On Cheap " Holiday Surgery"

[taxexile]

Warning on cheap 'holiday surgeries'

By Jane Metlikovec, health reporter

AUSTRALIAN women are getting off the plane and going back under the knife to fix botched plastic surgery performed on the cheap overseas.

The growing popularity of cut-price cosmetic surgery holidays has seen at least 35 women from New South Wales and 14 Victorian women return from Asia needing treatment for medical complications over the past three years.

Among them was a woman in her 20s who returned to Melbourne from Thailand unable to close her eyes after an operation to remove excess skin above her eyelid. She needed skin grafts.

Another Victorian needed extra surgery after a bungled Bangkok breast lift.

Australian women are being lured by package deals such as a full facelift and breast enlargement at a Malaysian hospital costing just over $10,000 – a saving of thousands of dollars on local rates.

The trend towards surgery holidays prompted the Australian Society for Plastic Surgeons to do a national survey last month to find out how often local surgeons were picking up the pieces of botched operations.

Perth plastic surgeons reported treating a staggering 66 beauty seekers needing treatment when they returned home.

New South Wales surgeons reported seeing 35 women, and Victoria was third with 14.

Most botched operations were performed in Thailand and Malaysia, with 66 cases in Bangkok and 17 from Malaysia.

Most women seeking treatment for complications had undergone breast enlargements, reductions and facelifts. Of the 68 surgeons surveyed, 40 reported seeing patients with complications or poor results, and 15 said they had treated more than one patient who had taken a cosmetic surgery holiday.

Melbourne plastic surgeon and Australian Society of Plastic Surgeons spokesman Graeme Southwick said he had seen a number of cosmetic surgery tourists at his Malvern rooms.

"I have seen several patients who have come to me with problems, and that number seems to be rising," he said.

Tourism surgery operators were putting unfair strain on Australia's health system, he said.

"These companies promise perfect results, they downplay plastic surgery as something you can just do on holiday.

"Every procedure is a risk, and so often we see these patients coming home with complications which need to be fixed.

"Of course we will treat them, but it is not fair to the taxpayer that Medicare then covers the costs of these cases."

link to article.

Edited May 10, 2007 by taxexile

[Mid]

never fails , does it ???

one or two days after some idea about a hub is floated ,

IT's SUNK .............................

[ProThaiExpat]

The involvement of drug companies with doctors is just coming to light. The involvement with certain newspaper reporters to special interest groups is well known.

Plastic surgery on womens faces is usually an elective surgery and unless I have it wrong, Australia's medical scheme doesn't pay for elective plastic surgery. Thus, women desiring it must go to private Oz plastic men who charge very high prices. Clearly, they would like to stop the cheaper competition in Thailand.

What better way that to get a reporter to post a "horror" story. The source for the "facts" regarding the "horror" must be the medical community in Oz.

One would need the stats on the number of plastic jobs done in Thailand a year to compare with this "horror" report before any kind of perspective can be found.

I for one find Thai doctors to be, on the whole, good and equal to almost any worldwide, except for the exceptional practitioners with big reps.

Nonetheless, I would search far and wide before undergoing the knife for "cosmetic surgery" in order to assure I got the result I desired.

Certainly, going only to a plastic surgeon who has worked on someone you know and have seen the result is a must.

[bkkbound04]

pte

sorry to disagree with u...

thailand's medical community is considered dire to most western countries...

99.9% of western doctors aren't suprised when they hear of botched operations performed by thai surgeons

bkk pattaya hospital is one of the key examples...it markets itself as a hospital on par with western hospitals lol they claim their dr's are all trained in europe and u.s...i'm sorry but if this was the case and these doctors were worth anything to the medical community( outside of thailand) then they'd have remained in the country they had trained in...but thai doctors don't make the grade in western hospitals

it may have something to do with the "loss of face" idea...i.e if u ask a question as u are unsure then u appear stupid anfd lose face...if u look at the countless professions in thailand this is clearly the case...the staff are sent to europe/u.s to learn a skill and return to thailand...but they don't ask the question they should...so they return to thailand only 1/2 trained and every job they do is either luck or disaster..and then needs re-done 2-3 months later...only in thailand

i learned the hard way that bkk-pattaya falls well short of the standard set by the west

[taxexile]

thailand's medical community is considered dire to most western countries...

i'm not taking sides here , but i'd like to know if you have any references to back up that statement.

there are rogue , unethical and incompetent practitioners in every country , western countries usually have checks and balances so that sooner or later these practitioners are to account for their performance , i dont think thailand has such a malpractice investigation system or that doctors are required to have indemnity insurance against disgruntled patients taking legal action.

[easybullet3]

i think that thailand is one of the most visited countries in the world for foreigenrs requiring a medical service. (cosmetic surgery and normal health care).

- i read maybe a million visitors a year that come to thailand purely for medical purposes.

theres always gonna be a few mistakes.... (just read the papers in your own country and see how many muck-ups YOUR doctors make back home).

thai medical services are on par with any western country.. (the hospitals are in far better shape than many I have been to in europe!!) many doctors are very qualified (though several can tend to be quite robotic) but on the whole, I have seen better medical treatment and consulting in thailand than I have seen in the UK.

i agree that the above story was probably written or commissioned by somebody within australias cosmetic circuit to slander and devalue thai services (that are FAR FAR cheaper and same standard).

[bkkbound04]

my friends and familly work in medicine, i've also seen the reactiion of my own gp and nurses...

imho thailand falls well short of the uk standard

compare thai hospitals with nhs hospitals.....compare private uk hospitals to the private types in thailand...bkk-pattay etc

thai falls short on both fields...i've tried to converse with a few consultants in thailand...the amusing/worrying thing is they don't speak fluent english..i.e don't understand questions put to them...they show a lack of english skills with their reply "yes" etc

...yet these same dr's claim to have trained in the uk/us...they can't have a basic conversation in english with a native yet are capable of learning complicated techniques and medical procedures in english? really?

one last point,

if u visit a thai hospital(private/public) or thai pharmacy why do they prescribe mass amounts of prescription drugs?

e.g uk dr would prescribe some antibiotics....the dr is aware of the condition u are suffering from and what medication should be given, u finish the antibiotics and u are healthy again pronto

in thailand u would leave the hospital with maybe 5-7 different set's of capsules...this isn't so much for prescription costs but more relevant to the fact that the dr probably wouldn't know the correct medication to prescribe...so they prescribe everything and anything

[PeaceBlondie]

We might reach agreement or a middle path in this subject if we narrow the scope of our observations. We are only talking about the medical tourists who leave their homes in the West to get cosmetic surgery. We're not talking about the bottom 99% of Thai surgeons, but the top 1%, who cater to farang and tourists. I don't think New Yorkers bypass Sloan-Kettering and get cancer treatment in Lampang.

PTE has a point: the OP may be journalism tainted by Aussie surgeons who are losing patients to Asian surgeons.

[samran]

PTE has a point: the OP may be journalism tainted by Aussie surgeons who are losing patients to Asian surgeons.

He has a huge point.

The Australian college of sergeons is basically a union for doctors and lobby group rolled into one. In Australia, they and the AMA are basically the most protected and pampered interest group in Australia - scared sh!tless of competition. What they are doing is no different to unions in other industries whining about foreingers taking their jobs.

The ACS and the AMA have been at the forefront of keeping medical costs in Australia unreasonably high, by effectively controlling the supply of doctors (who qualifies and for what) and the role of nurses who could do more - if they were only allowed. They are one the last unreformed industries in Australia - along with the Pharmacists who make ownership restrictions in Thailand look like a liberal wet dream when you compare how hard it is to own a pharmacy business in Australia.

Any thing that comes out of their mouth I'd view with a massive, actually, an iceberg sized 'grain' of salt.

[taxexile]

or that doctors are required to have indemnity insurance against disgruntled patients taking legal action.

i had a look at the thai medical association website , and read some articles from the thai medical journals that are available on the site regarding ethics and malpractice etc.

thai doctors are increasingly worried about being sued for malpractice , along with the stress , expense and loss of status among colleagues and patients that an adverse ruling and a public hearing can bring , the consensus seemed to be to settle out of court wherever possible , as advised by the indemnity insurance companies here. that seems to be the way things go in the west , and it seems that thailand is following suit. i dont know if the hospitals are responsible for errors or the doctors themselves.

[gregchambers]

People have to do research before they do the surgery, simple as that. Package providers/consultants (not the actual doctors) are just as notorious in the West when touting for local business. The internet makes things much easier than before so just put some effort into it.

I recently had a problem with gum disease. In the UK I could have gone to a private dentist who may or may not have known what to do (basically deep planing, cleaning between the gum and where it sits on the tooth and easy for some incompetent idiot to destroy the gum) and would have been charged at least three hundred quid for a session (three sessions needed!). I could have tried to register with a NHS dentist, waited for an appointment and then been referred to a gum specialist (at least a month I would guess) and ended up paying perhaps a hundred quid to cover the visits. I could have turned up at a dental hospital, waited a few hours, be seen for free by whoever was on duty and then had it "treated" by a student dentist who would have taken perhaps two hours to do what a qualified dentist would do in forty minutes, with racked up pain levels and probably poor results.

In Bangkok, I shot over to a dental clinic (recommended on this site), got treated by one of the leading gum specialists in the country and paid 150 quid for three (somewhat painful but then I am pitiful in the dentist's chair) sessions, problem solved and gum okay. My own fault for avoiding regular cleaning sessions.

The point is, you have to find out, directly as possible, who the leading surgeons are in the country in the particular area you want fixed - the kind of talented chaps in the UK who only bother with movie stars and the rich but in Thailand due to much more reasonable costs (like the hookers) are available to most farang. No doubt there are plenty of butchers in Bangkok as there are in the UK/USA...

[lazeeboy]

People have to do research before they do the surgery, simple as that. Package providers/consultants (not the actual doctors) are just as notorious in the West when touting for local business. The internet makes things much easier than before so just put some effort into it.

I recently had a problem with gum disease. In the UK I could have gone to a private dentist who may or may not have known what to do (basically deep planing, cleaning between the gum and where it sits on the tooth and easy for some incompetent idiot to destroy the gum) and would have been charged at least three hundred quid for a session (three sessions needed!). I could have tried to register with a NHS dentist, waited for an appointment and then been referred to a gum specialist (at least a month I would guess) and ended up paying perhaps a hundred quid to cover the visits. I could have turned up at a dental hospital, waited a few hours, be seen for free by whoever was on duty and then had it "treated" by a student dentist who would have taken perhaps two hours to do what a qualified dentist would do in forty minutes, with racked up pain levels and probably poor results.

In Bangkok, I shot over to a dental clinic (recommended on this site), got treated by one of the leading gum specialists in the country and paid 150 quid for three (somewhat painful but then I am pitiful in the dentist's chair) sessions, problem solved and gum okay. My own fault for avoiding regular cleaning sessions.

The point is, you have to find out, directly as possible, who the leading surgeons are in the country in the particular area you want fixed - the kind of talented chaps in the UK who only bother with movie stars and the rich but in Thailand due to much more reasonable costs (like the hookers) are available to most farang. No doubt there are plenty of butchers in Bangkok as there are in the UK/USA...

my business in thailand keeps me linked very closely to plastic sergery etc and in 13 years have only come across 1 botched case, personally most of the people under taking any kind of sergery

are advised to use yanhee hospital in bkk .the amount of sergery under taken in thailand far out ways that of austrailia i think were talking sour grapes here.sure theres back street botox clinics etc ,but no westerner would even consider them im sure ,they are purely for the thais .the sergeons in thaland are some of the busiet inthe world ,as they say practice makes perfect.this is an advertiseing smear campain to boost the industry in there own country.

[MyPenRye]

PTE has a point: the OP may be journalism tainted by Aussie surgeons who are losing patients to Asian surgeons.

He has a huge point.

The Australian college of sergeons is basically a union for doctors and lobby group rolled into one. In Australia, they and the AMA are basically the most protected and pampered interest group in Australia - scared sh!tless of competition. What they are doing is no different to unions in other industries whining about foreingers taking their jobs.

The ACS and the AMA have been at the forefront of keeping medical costs in Australia unreasonably high, by effectively controlling the supply of doctors (who qualifies and for what) and the role of nurses who could do more - if they were only allowed. They are one the last unreformed industries in Australia - along with the Pharmacists who make ownership restrictions in Thailand look like a liberal wet dream when you compare how hard it is to own a pharmacy business in Australia.

Any thing that comes out of their mouth I'd view with a massive, actually, an iceberg sized 'grain' of salt.

Same in Canada (and I suspect in many countries). However, Canada is known around the world for accepting immigrants. Immigration Canada accepts their credentials, then the local/provincial medical associations deny the foreign credentials and asks them to redo their training (this is also done in teaching,...). The colleges are happy. The doctors are happy (supply and demand). Canada does not mind becasuse they get a good number of cheap, well educated immigrants,... Capitalism and some human beings are disgusting, when you think of families and children being affected.

[Zaalti]

I know this topic is 2 years old, but I would just like to put my opinion. I have been researching HEAPS on cosmetic surgery. After reading horror stories of botched operations in the US, I am tending to look towards Thailand. Just check the "Makemeheal.com" website to see the number of botched cases in the US done by supposedly competent western surgeons. The surgeon I am planning to approach in Thailand for my blepharoplasty has done 5000 cases of bleph. I think I would rather go to a surgeon who has done more of this particular type of surgery than staying in my country and having it done from a western surgeon who might have only done 500 of this if he was lucky. In surgery, practice still makes perfect.

[jackoneilone]

Western Eastern European whatever!

None of that makes a difference.

The skill, artistry, education, qualifications, training, accreditations, experience, abilities and knowledge of the individual surgeon makes all the difference. Not the country nor the hospital itself per se.

Thailand has some worldclass PS surgeons famous the world over eg Preecha. Also has surgeons trained, educated and Licensed to perform in those "western" countries.

At the end of the day its upto the patient to do all the research and ask all the questions and dig and dig and understand thoroughly what they want and who is best.

unfortunately many go just for price rather than expertise, training and standards eg in singaporeexpat and then when things go botched wonder why.....

others are too lazy and trust everything to a business to do it for them which a business never would. nobody will care about ur body as much as u would. and if things go botch cry foul.

Point is its upto the patient to find the best and most experienced for themselves! Every so called developed and regulated country also has their own barrel of horror stories and idiotic incompetant surgeons which is no different from other parts of the world. Some countries overall may have lower standards of care, responsibility and legal obligations than others but even within those countries you could find world class surgeons in respective fields.

Patients need to educate themselves and do their own research.