Huge bill for NHS when operations abroad go wrong

COSMETIC and obesity surgery abroad is costing the NHS up to £20,000 per patient when things go wrong, analysis suggests.

- By JANE KIRBY

Janet Savage died during a gastric sleeve operation in Turkey

A review of surgical tourism found people can spend several weeks in NHS hospitals when they return home from having procedures such as bariatric surgery for obesity, tummy tucks and breast enlargement.

Complications treated by the NHS include infected wounds, with some people needing intensive care and prolonged use of antibiotics.

Researchers said they were also aware of reports of multiple organ failure due to sepsis from wound infection, and death due to hypoxic brain injury and cardiac arrest.

Foreign Office data obtained by the Press Association shows six Britons died in 2024 in Turkey following medical procedures there, with at least six more dying in the country in the previous year.

Janet Lynne Savage, 54, from Penrhosgarnedd, near Bangor, died after major artery trauma during a gastric sleeve weight-loss procedure in Turkey in 2023.

The driving examiner was taken to an intensive care unit and could not be saved after problems developed during the procedure which took place at a private hospital.

She was found to have died from acute bleeding loss due to injury to her abdominal aorta, which had an attempted repair, due to gastric sleeve surgery, said a senior coroner at the inquest into her death.

The authors of the new study, published in BMJ Open, said the scale of the problem is underestimated due to a lack of data on the issue.

Experts from Cardiff and Bangor universities examined 37 studies, of which 19 included complications treated by the NHS due to metabolic/bariatric surgery, 17 included complications due to cosmetic surgery, and one involved complications arising from eye surgery.