They initially aroused surprise and curiosity, most often moving in groups in the streets of Istanbul, the back of their necks and the bottom of their heads wrapped in bandages and displaying bloody skulls. Members of a cult? War wounded? Appearing around ten years ago, the survivors of hair implants who walk along the Bosphorus no longer surprise anyone. Over the years, their ranks have grown with volunteers from rhinoplasty, liposuction and many others, who have come to take advantage of quality medical facilities, well-trained professionals and unbeatable prices.
However, it was one of these operations, in this case the “Brazilian butt lift” which, in mid-January, cost the life of a young 26-year-old English patient, mother of three children. The operation, which lasts four to six hours, under general anesthesia, consists of taking adipose tissue from certain regions of the body to transfer it to the buttocks, in order to increase its firmness, volume and shape. The young mother had already gone to Istanbul for a dental operation with which she was satisfied and decided to repeat the experience for a cost of 3,500 euros, three times lower than the price charged in clinics in her country. Victim of a fat embolism, she died in the taxi which was taking her for her post-operative check-up, just before taking her plane to England.
“Turkey has been the new fashionable destination for ten years, but if some are delighted with their experience, I also receive a lot of complaints,” warns Muriel Bessis, founder of the Association of Successes and Failures of Cosmetic Surgery. “In France, cosmetic surgery is regulated, in particular by the Kouchner law of 2002. But in Turkey, there is no specific legislation. The risk of being tempted by the advertisements which flood the networks and of coming across charlatans are real,” she worries.
“A price five times cheaper than in France for the installation of 12 crowns and 12 dental veneers, I was sold a dream…” says Romain, 44 years old. But this turned into a nightmare. Phished by a salesperson via the social network Instagram, he was operated on in 2021 in a clinic in the suburbs of Istanbul, but his crowns were poorly placed, poorly glued and everything poorly cleaned, causing him serious infections. “I went back two months later because I was in excruciating pain and there was a horrible smell, but they just told me I had an allergy and sent me home,” he says. -he. Since then, he has continued to struggle with the consequences of the operation: “Part of my mouth has become necrotic with all the infections, I have taken five antibiotics, and had almost weekly appointments with the dentist for two years. to take care of everything. Today, things are a little better, but the bad smell persists,” he laments. A disastrous experience which even pushed him to try to end his life.
A spa transformed into a hospital
While some clinics are devoted exclusively to cosmetic surgery, the overwhelming majority of the sector is made up of agencies that take care of contacting clients, finding a doctor and renting an available room in one of the city’s hospitals. , the time of the operation. With her fluent command of French, English and Arabic, Marwan, a 35-year-old Tunisian, has been working in this sector in Istanbul for five years. “The problem is that some colleagues accept all customers as long as they pay, even when it comes to heavy operations. I, for example, will never accept a person over 100 kilos for liposuction, nor diabetic patients for certain interventions because of coagulation problems”, testifies the young woman. Some of his colleagues are less careful or choose to take patients at their word. “People consider plastic surgery as an imperative need that will change their lives,” she explains. “They are willing to lie about their medical history and take risks with their health, so you always have to do a battery of tests .”
Sarah, 50, had embarked, full of hope, on her journey to Istanbul in 2022. “I wanted to solve a problem with my cheekbones, I had already had injections, but I was looking for implants for a solution permanent,” she remembers. Convinced by a very low price (6,000 euros, hotel included) and photographs of previous operations, she went to Istanbul, welcomed by a driver who took her to a “very clean” place. But soon, things take a turn for the worse: she spends the night before her operation in a cramped room under the roof. In fact, she realizes too late that it is a spa, used illegally as a plastic surgery hospital. The operation goes badly. The doctor who operates on him, by dropping a tool, damages his nose. “When I saw the damage, the stitches and the huge scar, I went crazy,” she says. “They just gave me creams for the healing, with their apologies, but I didn’t I didn’t give up on the advice of a lawyer, I made them sign papers so that they take responsibility for the consequences of this operation.”
But while she is being taken back to her hotel, the car gets lost on a distant and deserted ring road alongside the highway. The driver and the doctor stop the vehicle, open the bags and forcefully grab the paper. “There, I was seized with terror and rage, I didn’t want them to leave me there, in the middle of the night, I fought with them, I tore off the doctor’s shirt, I got on the hood while calling the French embassy,” she said. Realizing that she has shared her location and that the police are on their way, the driver becomes frightened, apologizes and bursts into tears while the doctor flees on foot. Faced with excessive legal costs, she however decided not to pursue charges against the doctor in question, who is now active in the city of Antalya.
Fake Syrian doctors
The poorly placed implants which caused her headaches and the aesthetic damage of this failed operation pushed her to turn to French hospitals where she received difficult – and only partial – care. Finally, she sets off again into the unknown in November 2023, to Tunisia this time, for an operation costing a few thousand euros which goes well.
“Cosmetic surgery is not a need, it is a luxury and people who have recourse to it must do so cautiously, knowing that going abroad will make postoperative follow-up complicated,” warns Serhan Tuncer, vice president of the Plastic Surgery Association of Turkey. This surgeon deplores that advertising and price are the main vectors of attracting patients, sometimes to the detriment of their health. “Unfortunately, there are still many scammers trying to take advantage of the boom in the sector,” he recalls. “People must be very careful in choosing their doctor.” At the end of August 2023, the affair, revealed by opposition media, of a fake Syrian surgeon and his Turkish cronies who operated completely illegally in Istanbul and had caused numerous victims, led to their arrest. “Unfortunately there are still fake doctors, especially foreign ones, in operation,” deplores Marwan. Recently, however, the Turkish state is strengthening controls. Several clinics which operated illegally or were used to launder money have been closed.”
Because if the authorities have long turned a blind eye, the reputation of the “medical tourism” sector is now at stake. A windfall which, by attracting 1.4 million visitors last year, brought in more than 2.1 billion euros.
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