John Ely Senior Health Reporter Mailonline 18 November 2022, 17:04, Updated 18 November 2022, 17:16
Warning: brutal content While many return home unscathed from Turkey, some Brits are not so lucky: one mother was left with an inch-deep gash on her thigh after stitches burst, and a grandmother was at risk of losing her nipple after a post-surgery infection.
Dozens of Britons have been left disabled by cheap surgeries carried out overseas, from wounds with tight stitches that burst in the toilet to suffering from necrotic tissue after botched operations.
MailOnline presents the terrifying, never before told story of two brave victims.
By sharing their experiences of life-changing hardship, they hope their warning will help others avoid the same fate.
Sarah* – The NHS saved my life
Unhappy with the way she looked, Sarah wanted to undergo a combination of abdominal and thigh liposuction and a Brazilian butt lift.
In June, she took the plunge.
On the recommendation of one of her friends, she booked a trip to Turkey for the surgery.
She paid £5,200 to have the operation, which included accommodation in a five-star hotel in Istanbul and transport from the airport.
That was just a fraction of the roughly £20,000 she would have been charged if she had the operation in the UK.
But Sarah, from Yorkshire, woke up feeling anxious after the operation after feeling underwhelmed by hospital staff.
“I didn’t sleep, I didn’t see any nurses, I just lay there in blood and bodily fluids,” she told Mail Online.
“When the nurse came in she didn’t understand what I was saying. I kept wondering what on earth I had done.”
The housewife was released from the hospital just two days after the surgery.
And even though she had just had major surgery, she was not provided with transportation to the hotel.
After returning to the UK, the stitches in her thigh suddenly split as she sat down to use the toilet, leaving a deep two-inch gash. Sarah sought help from the NHS, who told her the stitches in her thigh had been too tightly sewn.
This meant Sarah had to walk a quarter mile to the hotel while carrying a plastic bag attached to a drainage pipe from her leaking wound.
“There was no transfer or anything and I had to walk back to the hotel with my surgical drains in a carrier bag,” she said.
But the horror didn’t end there: Sarah was in so much pain she couldn’t move for two days – she spent two days sitting in her hotel bed with a “puppy pad” over her head to soak up the fluid leaking from her stitches.
“I packed a black bag full of water every day. The room smelled awful because of me and I was so weak and in so much pain.”
But little did she know, the worst was yet to come.
After a gruelling four-hour flight home, Sarah spent a few more days in bed recovering.
When she sat down to go to the toilet, the stitches in her thigh suddenly split, leaving a two-inch deep gash.
“My leg was splitting open, my heart was racing and I was so scared,” she said.
Sarah was rushed to hospital by her concerned family, where NHS doctors administered an emergency blood transfusion after her blood pressure suddenly fell.
She then saw a plastic surgeon who was reportedly “outraged” that she had been discharged from the Turkish hospital so soon after the operation.
He told her that the stitching on her thighs was too tight and prone to tearing.
Additionally, because so much tissue was removed, the wounds had to heal “from the inside out,” meaning they could not be stitched up and required ongoing care to heal properly.
Four months on and still recovering from her ordeal, Sarah praised the NHS and social care staff who looked after her, speaking to MailOnline.
“The nurses came in every day and were just amazing. Thank you NHS, they saved my life.”
Surprisingly, she had never spoken to the surgeon in person until the day of her surgery.
Sarah saw a British plastic surgeon who was “disgusted” that the scars on her thighs had not healed for months after she was discharged from a Turkish hospital immediately after the operation.
Instead, after she sent photos of her body, members of his team sent her text messages with advice on what surgery she should undergo.
“I said, ‘That’s fine because I trust you,'” she said.
Sarah was initially impressed with how she was treated when she was picked up in a “lovely” bus from Istanbul and taken straight to her hotel with other British women who had also come for the operation.
This positive impression was soured after she met the surgeon who told her he would mark her for the procedure during the procedure.
Typically, before surgery, the areas to be removed are marked, with the patient’s input taken into account, to prevent any mistakes.
Sarah eventually got some of the £5,200 back but says it was insufficient compensation compared to the risk she says her life was put at.
Kate* – My nipples were destroyed during surgery in Türkiye
Kate underwent a series of expensive operations in Turkey in June.
She admitted that “vanity” was the only reason and she underwent an upper eyelid lift, upper arm lift, breast reduction with lift, abdominoplasty and extensive liposuction, all in one go, at a cost of £15,000.
Although a large amount, it is only a fraction of what a 65-year-old man would have paid in the UK.
Kate, from the northwest, contacted a UK-based agency who offered to handle all the arrangements to get her done in one of Turkey’s major cities.
“They offered us a five-star hotel, breakfast, a friend to stay with us, VIP airport transfers, massages and everything else in the package,” she said.
The part-time nursing assistant was led to believe she was speaking to a real doctor as she arranged the package.
Only after the surgery had taken place did she learn that the discussion had taken place with the cosmetic surgeon’s wife.
Initially, the surgery went according to plan, but Kate became concerned when she noticed that one of her nipples had turned a very dark colour.
Kate later learned that this was a sign that the tissue was slowly dying due to a loss of blood supply.
After the operation, Kate was alarmed by the extreme darkening of one of her nipples, which she later learned was a sign that it was slowly dying due to a reduced blood supply. Kate praised the NHS staff who treated her nipple as “incredible”, and acknowledged that taxpayers were effectively subsidising the mistakes of overseas surgeons.
But the Turkish team reassured the grandmother that this was normal.
She said: “I was told, ‘It’s OK, it’s just blood oozing from the graft just below the surface, so it’s OK,’ but then it all started to deteriorate from there.”
After 10 days in Turkey, Kate returned home to Liverpool but became increasingly worried about the state of her nipples.
“When I got home, I noticed my nipples were starting to darken and dry out,” she says. “They looked like they had scabs on them.”
Kate sent photos to the agency who arranged the operation, and to the surgeon himself, but he simply advised her to use an antibiotic cream and moisturizer, which she continued to do for a few weeks.
“I was assured that every photo and message I sent was OK,” she said.
Kate even claimed that the Turkish medical team actively prevented her from telling her GP about her nipples.
She said doctors told her that British doctors “don’t know anything and are not qualified to make decisions on this matter”.
But after telling a friend about her symptoms, Kate was advised to see a doctor, which she did.
He encouraged Kate to go to a nearby NHS walk-in centre, where staff were shocked by the state of her nipples.
“The nurse I saw was practically hysterical. I was so shocked by her reaction that I started crying,” she said.
The nurse returned her to her GP, who arranged an urgent referral to the breast care unit at the nearest hospital.
There, a specialist confirmed that her nipple had necrosis and that part of it needed to be removed.
They added that Kate was lucky to have come at that time, otherwise she might have lost the entire nipple.
Since then, she has had to undergo weekly checkups, which include the application of special vacuum dressings to promote healing.
Kate praised the NHS staff who treated her as “fantastic” and acknowledged that taxpayers were effectively subsidising mistakes made by overseas surgeons.
Although Kate’s necrotic nipples were her biggest concern, she was also unhappy with the shape of her arms after a lift and the shape of her waist after liposuction.
She now requires various corrective operations and, bizarrely, has also paid £10,000 to have them done in Turkey.
Kate acknowledged that this might seem strange given her recent experience, but said the cost of the operation in the UK left her with no other choice.
“We can’t afford it in the UK,” she said.
She called for stricter restrictions on who can advertise or arrange surgery for Brits overseas.
For anyone considering having surgery abroad, Kate had this advice:
“Do your homework. There’s a lot to be careful about,” she said.
“Look at past patients and research the surgeon’s background.”
*Names have been changed to protect anonymity.
