Overview

• 93 Americans died after receiving cosmetic surgery in the Dominican Republic between 2009 and 2022, according to the CDC.
• Autopsy reports were available for 20 of the cases, and in all of them, the patients suffered complications either during or after surgery.
• A fat embolism, a condition when particles of fat in the bloodstream block blood vessels, was the cause of death for 11 of the cases.
• For seven other cases, the cause of death was a condition known as pulmonary venous thromboembolism, which is a sudden blockage in a lung artery.
• The CDC said risk factors like obesity and multiple procedures being performed during the same operation could have been mitigated or prevented with improved surgical protocols and postoperative care.