A 21-year-old woman has died after a nose job left her lungs filled with blood.
Karen Julieth Cárdenas Uribe left the clinic in Bucaramanga, Santander Department, Colombia, just minutes after her rhinoplasty operation on 29 January.
However, she passed out as soon as she arrived home, at which point concerned loved ones struggled trying to revive her.
The 21 year old, who was in the last semester of her psychology course at Pontifical Bolivarian University, was taken to a nearby hospital, where she suffered six cardiorespiratory arrests.
Her brother - who was not named - explained to Jam Press: “She was admitted at 5am and the surgery started at 7am. It lasted until 1.30pm.
“At 2pm she was already with us and she fainted just a few minutes later. We immediately managed to revive her and she woke up, but perhaps the effects of the medication were already wearing off and she fainted again.”
Concerned relatives contacted the surgeon who carried out the nose job and they said he advised them to bring her back to the same clinic.
However, due to the 21-year-old woman’s worsening condition, her family decided to take her to the Los Comuneros Clinic, situated closer to their home in the neighbourhood of San Francisco.
According to the victim’s brother, she was admitted to the ICU, where doctors managed to revive her again. However, after she continued to lose consciousness, she was eventually intubated.
He added: “After they intubated her, they saw she had a considerable amount of blood in her lungs, trachea and oesophagus and she couldn’t breathe. They did what they could, but after six cardiorespiratory arrests she passed away.”
The family said they will file a complaint with the Public Prosecutor’s Office to establish if any parties are culpable of medical negligence.
The brother said: “We want justice, she was a healthy woman. She never had any serious health problems and she was in good physical shape.”
The investigation is ongoing.
According to the American Society of Plastic Surgeons, nose reshaping was the most popular cosmetic surgery procedure in 2020, with 352,555 procedures performed in the US.
