Health
ABC Australia

Brazilian butt lift deaths spark warning from Australasian plastic surgeons society

August 14, 2018

It's fast becoming a popular procedure but there's a warning from some plastic surgeons about the so-called 'Brazilian butt lift'.

The new operation has a dramatically higher death rate than any other cosmetic procedure and has caused a string of deaths internationally.

Kate Szepanowski, a social media influencer, told the ABC in Australia what's involved with a Brazilian butt lift, or BBL.

"They pretty much liposuction the whole body and then put it into the bum. And about one in three of my friends have had that done," she said.

But young women are largely unaware of the dangers.

The Australasian Society of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons has warned its members that the international mortality rate for BBL is higher than for any other cosmetic surgery procedure.

"It's now known that that is quite a dangerous procedure. The mortality rate form Brazilian butt lift, so-called, is up to one in 3,000," plastic surgeon Scott Ingram said.

The mortality rate for all other cosmetic procedures is one in 55,000.

But it's not just BBLs that are causing concern.

Surgeons are also highlighting the danger of getting dermal filler injections without a doctor present. 

Dermal fillers are injected into the face to pump out the skin.

The ABC's Four Corners programme has discovered that in April doctors at Sydney's Prince of Wales Hospital treated Australia's first patient who was permanently blinded in one eye after having dermal filler injected into her face by a nurse at a beauty clinic.

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