Telugu film actress Arti Agarwal, whose sudden untimely death in New Jersey in the U.S. reportedly after a liposuction surgery went awry, was turned away by a Hyderabad-based plastic and cosmetic surgeon whom she approached, expressing her desire to go under the knife.
The surgeon reportedly told the actress that she would not benefit from liposuction because she hardly had any fat under her skin, indicating that it was not the first time that the actress was opting for having excess fat removed by way of suction.
He explained to her that in her status, liposuction could not be done because whatever fat she had was in the abdomen.
The surgeon convinced her to refraining for going through with the surgery then.
Ms. Agarwal’s apparent desperation to find a quick-fix solution to excess weight is reflected in the growing trend of women eager to visit a cosmetic surgery clinic to have fat sucked out. But what if one is not in the right hands and the surgery goes awry?
“The first principle of liposuction is that it should not be used as a tool for weight reduction,” said Sudhakar Prasad, cosmetic surgeon at Apollo Hospitals in Hyderabad.
“The surgery is meant for body contouring, to attain a shapely body. Complications arise when large volumes of fat are removed and a lot of other issues come into play.”
Dr. Prasad said it is criminal to remove more than three litres of fat through liposuction and cautioned doctors to be careful with underinformed patients.
He said it was difficult to say what exactly led to Ms. Agarwal’s demise, although she was said to be suffering from chronic asthma.
Fat embolism, said to be one of the fatal causes in post-liposuction cases, he maintained, is rare and can happen only in 1 among 10,000 cases.
“Death in the post-operative period is very rare,” said Vijayawada-based cosmetic surgeon K. Srikrishna.
“In the case of Aarti Agarwal, if death happened immediately after surgery, it has been be due to fat embolism. If it happened after a week or 10 days, it could be because of infection.”
A few other cosmetic surgeons, who refused to be identified, pointed to the lack of clear-cut guidelines on such surgeries from the Medical Council of India or the Plastic Surgeons’ Society, an apex body of the fraternity.
The first principle of liposuction is that it should not be used as a tool for weight reduction.
Sudhakar Prasad
Cosmetic surgeon, Apollo Hospitals, Hyderabad
Liposuction is for people who are close to their goal weight (the body weight required as per their sex, age and height)
P.V. Sudhakar
HoD of Plastic Surgery, KGH
