Dallas Plastic Cosmetic Surgery Errors Attorney

Patients typically undergo plastic surgery for one of two reasons:

1. To undergo elective procedures in an effort to alter or improve appearance. This can include surgeries such as breast augmentation, nose reshaping, facelifts, liposuction, and more.
2. To undergo procedures to restore normal appearance due to a traumatic accident, birth defect, or another deformity. This can include natural birth malformations, breast reconstruction after cancer, facial reconstruction, dog bite injury repairs, hernia repairs, and more.

Regardless of the reason that a person is undergoing cosmetic or plastic surgery, all patients should be able to count on a high standard of care from the surgeon. However, Johns Hopkins researchers say that medical mistakes are the third leading cause of death in the country. Unfortunately, many of these errors occur during surgical procedures.

According to the Plastic Surgery Statistics Report released by the American Society of Plastic Surgeons, we can see that there are approximately 24 million cosmetic procedures performed every year in the US. Out of these procedures, there are approximately 18.1 cosmetic surgical procedures and 5.9 million reconstructive procedures.

Any surgery is considered invasive, and there are times when patients experience “never events.” These events are mistakes that should absolutely not happen during surgery. This can include:

• Operating on the wrong body part
• Operating on the wrong patient
• Performing the wrong procedure
• Leaving an object inside of a patient
• Anesthesia errors

Never events can lead to significant patient harm, and data indicates that there are approximately 4,000 preventable errors reported each year across the US. However, there are many other “minor” surgical errors that are not reported that can also cause significant patient harm.

Further complicating matters concerning cosmetic surgeries is the fact that many of these surgeries are performed at surgical centers and not fully equipped hospitals. Mistakes made during plastic surgery can result in significant patient scarring, organ damage, heavy blood loss, infections, nerve damage, and more.