Ugly end to beauty quest
For some, a trip to the plastic surgeon’s clinic changed their lives for the worst.
IF Mariela Diaz could travel back in time, she would go back to Monday morning, Aug 12, 2013, and block her teenage daughter from going to a cosmetic surgery clinic for a breast augmentation procedure.
Five minutes after the surgery at Coral Gables Cosmetic Center in Miami, Florida, L inda Perez, 18 at the time, started developing problems when her heart rate and blood pressure dropped significantly, causing her to become unconscious, barely breathing. After the doctor who administered the anesthesia tried to resuscitate her for more than 30 minutes, she had to be transported by ambulance to Mercy Hospital, where she lay comatose for weeks.
She had suffered severe brain damage, due to a lack of oxygen to the brain, according to state records. When she left the hospital, she was unable to move or speak.
Today, L inda Perez, now 21 and mother ofa six- year- old son, has gained back some weight, can speak a few words and can stand alone for a few seconds. Doctors have told her mother she will never recover fully. The family is struggling financially and their attorneys have set up a gofundme. com campaign to help with her medical expenses.
“No one would want to live just a tiny bit ofwhat I have lived,” said Mariela Diaz, who takes care of her daughter and grandson. “I tell the daughters and mothers to think it over before going to those clinics, because they never know how they are going to come out. They should accept what they have naturally.”
Her daughter already had undergone a buttocks augmentation procedure before the breast augmentation procedure.
The Florida Department of Health filed an administrative complaint against the physician who administered the anesthesia, Dr Mario Alberto Diaz of Miami. According to the settlement agreement with the Department, Diaz has to pay a US$ 10,000 fine and complete 15 hours of Continuing Medical Education.
Diaz paid the US$ 10,000 fine on Jan 6 this year, and on Jan 12, paid an additional US$ 11,288 to reimburse the Department of Health for its investigative costs. Additionally, he has to complete a medical records course by the Florida Medical Association by Dec 15 this year. Diaz did not admit nor deny the allegations in the complaint, according to state records.
Cases like this are not uncommon in South Florida. In fact, there were 46 office surgery deaths in Florida from 2000- 2010, the latest period that data are available.
L ast month Heather Meadows, a 29- year- old West Virginia mother of two young children, died after undergoing a fat transfer procedure at Encore Plastic Surgery in Hialeah, Florida. The Miami- Dade Medical Examiner’s Office said she died from fat clots that entered her bloodstream during a fat transfer procedure, causing her heart and lungs to fail.
Just a week before Meadows died, on May 7, Catherine Gonzalez, a 19- year- old from Hialeah, was hospitalised for eight days after suffering three respiratory arrests following a liposuction at Encore Plastic Surgery.
Another woman, Yahaira Espada, travelled from the US Army base at Fort Greely, Alaska, to Miami in January for a liposuction and butt augmentation at Vanity Cosmetic Surgery, which is affiliated with Encore Plastic Surgery. She found the centre on the Internet.
The procedure cost US$ 5,000, said Espada, but the results were far from her wish for “a butt like Kim Kardashian’s.” She now has a 15cm lump on her hip. She said it is pain- ful, and she cannot move.
The Florida Department of Health has charged physicians who work at Encore Plastic Surgery and two other clinics, Vanity Cosmetic Surgery and Spectrum Aesthetics in Miami, with medical malpractice and employing unlicensed professionals. Police and federal authorities have charged other doctors affiliated with the clinics with attempted murder, kidnapping and prescription drug fraud.
The Florida Department of Health is trying to revoke the licence ofthe doctor who performed Espada’s procedure, Osakatukei “Osak” Omulepu, for medical malpractice after he seriously injured four patients in three days in May 2015.
In the case of Linda Perez, the administrative complaint says Diaz should have responded “in a more aggressive and timely fashion’’ to deal with Perez’s sudden drop of blood pressure. The complaint also said Diaz failed to provide an adequate airway for assisted breathing during the prolonged resuscitation process.
The Florida Department of Health is familiar with Diaz, a convicted felon who went to federal prison for illegally selling pills online. He pleaded guilty in March 2006 in the US District Court for the Northern District of Iowa.
In August 2007, the Florida Department of Health reached an agreement with Diaz that allowed him to keep his licence, after a oneyear suspension following his prison term. The department stipulated that he be placed under “direct supervision” ofa licensed physician.
Today, the state’s licence verification website indicates Diaz’s licence is active with obligations.
Mariela Diaz said she still hopes that some day “justice will be done” in her daughter’s case. She has not explained to her grandson, Dainier, who just started elementary school, why his mother cannot play or speak with him.
“You can imagine. He’s a little kid. What can I tell him? I tell him that his mother is sick,” said Diaz, whose family is in Cuba. “He asks me why his mother can’t run with him, carry him and dance with him, like she used to.”
Helping her daughter to sip water from a baby cup with images of Minnie Mouse last week, Diaz said she feels like she’s raising two children.
Her daughter “is like a baby again. I have to teach her to eat, carry her to the bathroom, help her to take little steps,” said Diaz. “Her son is the one who helps me to take care of her.” – Miami Herald/ Tribune News Service