December 20th 2005

Advanced Medi Travel would like to advise the seriousness of contemplating surgical procedures whether in Australia or on their own out side of the country, however more importantly would like to express their concern to that of which the Australian Media and the Australian Society of Plastic Surgery will go to, to keep over priced surgery within Australia. It is important to realize that many procedures that have not been successful have been organized directly between the patient and the hospital. This practice is unsafe and unwise as YOU do not have the experience in selecting the best surgeon or a course to be represented in the event that you have an unforeseen complication you do not have a representative to assist you in corrective surgery in the event that this problem should arise.

With any surgical procedure their are associated risks and these risks are increased when we choose elective surgery, however with youth , divorce and beauty, many of us choose to participate in these practices to sustain confidence, self esteem and a image that fulfils our desires. Advanced Medi -Travel has an impeccable record with their selected surgeons and clients with a 99% success rate, and the 1% of clients have been negotiated and resolved by your representative providing all clients with a 100% overall success rate.We consider this to be a fantastic result.

How many people in Australia have procedures daily with complications that we do not hear about. 

WHY?

The Australian Society of Cosmetic and Plastic Surgeons have registered members with which you can check if a surgeon is a registered member, however the organizations only provide names of their surgeons who specialize in certain procedures and in their designated states, however do not discuss or disclose if any of their members have had litigation against them due to the privacy legislation. There is no way of telling if a surgeon has performed a bad procedure unless word of mouth by previous clients, or the patient has made a complaint to the media. Many GP's are now conducting Cosmetic surgery procedures without the skills and training of a fully qualified plastic surgeon, and the statistics of bad procedures are increasing.

Plastic Surgeons are complaining about such practices but not with the fuss that they conduct when an alleged procedure goes wrong overseas, and why is it whenever it is an overseas hospital they immediately try to mislead the public that the procedure was performed at World Famous Accredited Hospital "The Bumrungrad International".

Answer: The Bumrungrad hospital treats more than 350,000 international clients annually, so what percentage of these are Australians and how much money are the Australian surgeons loosing. Well there is obviously a large number of Australians being treated for Medical, Dental, Cosmetic and plastic surgery procedures, eye lasik, Hair Transplants and Dermatology. Unfortunately the statistics to calculate the amount of money going to a poor person's country is impossible to imagine, however what we can tell you is it has the Australian surgeons more than a little scared.

Lets look at the lady that had severe scaring after surgery and expressed her distress to Australia on Today Tonight and the Sydney paper. This lady stated that she was emotionally distressed prior to her procedures and suffered depression as her husband had left her for a younger women. She claims that she was not properly anaesthetized as she felt everything during surgery, however the media failed to advise us correctly that she chose to have her surgery performed under a local anesthetic to cut down her costs. At no time did Ms O'Hea state that she had pain during her procedure.

Some people suffer a skin disorder called keloid scarring, which has no reflection on the surgeon or surgery. In most cases a qualified surgeon can determine this disorder prior to surgery and inform the patient that their scarring may be more predominant than others, and many patients may still choose to proceed knowing that their hair may cover such scarring.

Ms O'Hea looked great after her procedure, considering she is 55 , and with her scarring hidden in her thick mop of beautiful hair to the world and considering her procedure was only 11 months old when aired, she would still expect some numbness of the forehead and hair loss directly following surgery.

Experienced medical practioners or previous patients that have had such a procedure would know this, and would have been advised prior to their procedure of the associated risks, but the poor ill informed people sitting at home contemplating surgery would be horrified to hear this, as numbness can take up to two years to return and seldom does this not return, however I am certain that all these associated risks are explained to all patients, whether in Australia or elsewhere.

Ms O'Hea also had a breast procedure performed in Australia that went wrong and had this corrected in Thailand but I don't think the media wanted you to know this either, after all this was an Australian surgeon, and not mentioned during her interview. She stated that she is prone to bad luck but sometimes it is a reflection on bad choices. The Australian Media is good at sensationalizing stories to increase their ratings and what better way to do so but with the ever increasing controversial issue of Plastic surgery, particularly overseas, as most people would have us believe that they have good genes and that they have never been touched by a scalpel, yet alone travel to a third world country to obtain their good looks.

It is important to remember that depression and ill health has an impact on our recovery after surgery. Healthy mind, healthy body.

It is time that the Australian Society of Plastic Surgeons realized that no amount of bad publicity is going to bring middle to lower class working people into their clinics, not for a matter of not wanting, but because this is the only way they can obtain their dream, and it is about time that instead of scaring these people, that you obtain compassion and understanding with a marginal element of support to assist these people in making informed decisions, by either reducing your costs or referring these people to reputable companies that can assist them, rather than permitting them to make mistakes by organizing their journey solo. The Bumrungrad International hospital is the only International accredited hospital in Asia run and managed by American executives with a high level of experienced plastic surgeons.

Maybe you should ask how many people are going to Thailand for corrective surgery that has been conducted by Australian surgeons that we don't hear about.

For further information please do not hesitate to contact me and this media page will be updated regularly to address issues that the media may release.

Best wishes

Christa Bradley
Advanced Medi Travel