Lenia Watson-Burton, a 37-year-old U.S. Navy administrator, anticipated that beauty surgical procedure would eliminate cussed fats rapidly and simply — simply because the online advertising promised.
As an alternative, she died three days after a liposuction-like process known as AirSculpt on the San Diego workplace of Elite Physique Sculpture, a beauty surgical procedure chain with greater than 30 places of work throughout the U.S. and Canada, court docket data present.
Beauty surgical procedure chains organising store in a number of states rely closely on promoting to draw clients: tv, print, social media influencers, even texts hawking discounted vacation charges. The pitches sometimes promise sufferers life-changing physique shaping with minimal ache and a fast restoration.
But there’s no federal requirement that surgical procedure corporations publish proof supporting the reality and accuracy of those advertising claims. No company tracks how often sufferers persuaded by gross sales pitches maintain painful problems akin to infections, how successfully surgeons and nursing workers observe up and deal with accidents, or whether or not corporations promoting new aesthetic gadgets and strategies have adequately educated surgeons to make use of them safely.
In 2023, Watson-Burton’s husband and 6 youngsters and stepchildren sued Elite Physique Sculpture and plastic surgeon Heidi Regenass for medical malpractice, alleging that the skinny cannula the surgeon used to take away fats perforated Watson-Burton’s bowel, inflicting her dying.
The go well with additionally accused Elite Physique Sculpture of posting false or deceptive promoting on its web site, akin to describing the clinic’s branded process AirSculpt as “light on the physique” and stating: “Our sufferers take the fewest doable dangers and get again to their common routine as quickly as 24-48 hours post-operation.”
Watson-Burton was one in all three sufferers who died after having liposuction and fats switch operations carried out by Regenass from October 2022 to February 2023, court docket data state. Households of all three ladies sued the surgeon, who denied wrongdoing in authorized filings. The events settled the Watson-Burton household case in 2024. Two different wrongful dying instances are pending, together with a go well with by an Ohio lady who alleges her mom relied on guarantees on Regenass’ web site that the operation in California can be secure with a fast restoration.
Neither Regenass nor her attorneys responded to repeated requests for remark. Emails and telephone calls to Elite Physique Sculpture’s Miami headquarters weren’t returned.
State and federal authorities do have the ability to ban false or deceptive medical promoting of all sorts, although enforcement is spotty, notably when promotions pop up on-line. Which means sufferers should do their very own homework in evaluating beauty surgical procedure advertising pitches.
“Whereas customers ought to be capable to belief that ad claims are substantiated as a result of the legislation requires them to be, the truth is that it pays for customers to carry a skeptical eye,” mentioned Mary Engle, an government vice chairman at BBB Nationwide Packages.
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‘Up a Cup’
Based by beauty surgeon Aaron Rollins, Elite Physique Sculpture says in Securities and Trade Fee filings that it provides a “premium affected person expertise and splendid, spa-like environment” at its rising community of facilities. The publicly traded firm, primarily based in Miami Seashore and backed by non-public fairness traders, markets AirSculpt as being “a lot much less invasive than conventional liposuction” and offering “quicker therapeutic with superior outcomes.” The advertisements say that AirSculpt “requires no scalpel, or stitches, and solely leaves behind a freckle-sized scar!” and that sufferers “stay awake the entire time and might stroll proper out of their process, having fun with dramatic outcomes!” Some dangers are disclosed.
Rollins, who lately made headlines for placing his Indian Creek mansion in the marketplace for $200 million, didn’t reply to repeated requests for remark. A lawyer for Rollins, Robert Peal, responded to an electronic mail however didn’t remark. On Nov. 4, the firm introduced that Rollins had resigned as government chairman of the board of administrators of AirSculpt Applied sciences and as a member of the board.
Aaron Rollins at an occasion in 2011.(Maury Phillips/WireImage by way of Getty Photos)
Many AirSculpt sufferers decide to have fats that’s faraway from their stomachs or different locations injected into their buttocks, usually known as a Brazilian butt raise. Others use the fats to reinforce their breasts, a process the corporate manufacturers as “Up a Cup.” Since March 2023, no less than seven sufferers have filed lawsuits accusing Elite Physique Sculpture of operating deceptive promoting or misrepresenting outcomes, arguing, amongst different issues, that they felt extra ache or healed far more slowly than the advertisements led them to imagine they might, court docket data present. One of many lawsuits has been dismissed, and the corporate has denied the allegations in others.
The Watson-Burton household argued of their lawsuit that some advertising claims about AirSculpt had been merely not true.
For example, Elite Physique Sculpture’s web site acknowledged that AirSculpt has “automated know-how” set to “flip off” earlier than the cannula penetrates the physique too deeply and presumably causes critical damage, based on the go well with. That function didn’t defend Watson-Burton, who paid $12,000 for the operation, hoping for a “fast and well timed restoration” earlier than a scheduled U.S. Navy deployment, based on the lawsuit.
Moderately than being light on the physique, AirSculpt was “extraordinarily painful, extremely invasive, unsafe, required greater than a brief 24-hour restoration interval and will and did injury inner organs,” based on the go well with.
Watson-Burton known as the San Diego heart on Oct. 27, 2022, a day after the operation, to report “extreme ache” in her higher stomach, however staffers took no motion to guage her, based on the go well with. The subsequent morning, an ambulance rushed her to a hospital, the place emergency surgical procedure confirmed the gravity of her accidents. Surgeons famous her accidents included three perforations of the small bowel and sepsis.
Watson-Burton died on Oct. 29, 2022. An post-mortem report cited problems of the beauty surgical procedure, ruling she died after changing into “septic following intraoperative small bowel perforation.” Her dying certificates lists the trigger as “problems of abdominoplasty.”
In court docket filings, Elite Physique Sculpture mentioned Watson-Burton had “skilled an unusual surgical complication.” The corporate denied that it made any “particular assure or illustration that damage to organs couldn’t happen.” It denied any legal responsibility or that its advertisements made misrepresentations.
The dispute by no means performed out totally in court docket. The events settled the case in August 2024, when Elite Physique Sculpture agreed to pay Watson-Burton’s household $2 million, the utmost below its insurance coverage coverage. Regenass, the surgeon, who didn’t carry legal responsibility insurance coverage, agreed to pay $100,000 extra, based on the settlement settlement.
Guarantees Not Stored
Social media pitches and online advertising additionally led Tamala Smith, 55, of Toledo, Ohio, to Regenass for liposuction and a fats switch, court docket data state.
Smith was lifeless lower than two weeks later, one in all two different ladies who died following elective operations Regenass carried out from December 2022 to February 2023, court docket data present. The surgeon operated on the 2 ladies at Pacific Liposculpture, which runs three surgical procedure facilities in Southern California, court docket data state.
The households of each ladies are suing Regenass, a board-certified plastic surgeon, and the surgical procedure heart. In each instances, that are pending in California courts, Regenass and the surgical procedure heart have denied the allegations and filed dismissal motions that deny accountability for the deaths.
California plastic surgeon Heidi Regenass has been sued for medical malpractice by the households of three ladies who died after having beauty surgical procedures. She has denied any negligence. One go well with has settled, and two are pending. (Screenshot by KFF Well being Information of Pacific Liposculpture, a defendant in two of the lawsuits)
Smith was a touring registered nurse working the in a single day shift at a hospital in Los Angeles. She selected Regenass after viewing the physician’s Instagram web page, based on a lawsuit filed by Smith’s daughter, Ste’Aira Ballard, who lives in Toledo.
The advertisements described the surgeon as an “awake liposuction and fats switch specialist,” whereas her web site assured sufferers they might really feel minimal ache and be “again to work in 24-48 hours,” based on the go well with.
In the course of the three-hour operation on Feb. 8, 2023, at Pacific Liposculpture’s Newport Seashore workplace, Regenass eliminated fats from Smith’s stomach and flanks and redistributed it to her buttocks, based on the go well with. Smith known as the workplace no less than twice in subsequent days to report ache and swelling, however a staffer instructed her that was regular, based on the go well with. Smith by no means spoke to the surgeon, based on the go well with.
When Ballard couldn’t attain her mom, she known as the hospital solely to be taught Smith hadn’t turned up for her in a single day shift for 2 days. The hospital known as police and requested for a welfare verify on the extended-stay lodge in Glendale, California, the place Smith had been dwelling.
An officer found her physique on the mattress “surrounded by towels and sheets which can be stained with brown and inexperienced fluids,” based on a coroner’s report within the court docket file. A countertop within the room was “lined in medical paperwork detailing post-operative directions from a liposuction clinic,” based on the report. Ballard mentioned she realized of her mom’s dying when she known as Smith’s cellphone; a police officer answered and delivered the devastating information.
“Oh, my God, I fell to the ground,” Ballard mentioned in an interview with KFF Well being Information and NBC Information. Ballard mentioned she nonetheless has not gotten over the shock and grief. “It bothers me as a result of how does somebody that devoted their life to avoid wasting different folks’s lives find yourself deceased in a lodge, as if her life didn’t matter?” she requested.
“I simply don’t perceive how she got here again to me in a physique bag,” says Ste’Aira Ballard, who holds a photograph of her mom, Tamala Smith.(Nic Antaya for KFF Well being Information)
Smith died after having beauty surgical procedure in California. (Nic Antaya for KFF Well being Information)
Ballard exhibits the ring her mom used to put on. (Nic Antaya for KFF Well being Information)
Ballard mentioned her mom trusted Regenass primarily based on her internet persona. She believes her mom, a registered nurse, wouldn’t have gone to the surgeon had she identified somebody had died after an operation Regenass carried out on the Pacific Liposculpture San Diego workplace. Terri Bishop, 55, a truck driving teacher who lived in Temecula, California, died on Dec. 24, 2022, about three weeks after present process liposuction and fats switch at Pacific Liposculpture, an organization with a historical past of run-ins with state regulators.
Pacific Liposculpture didn’t reply to requests for remark. In court docket filings, the corporate has denied that the operations performed a job in both affected person’s dying and moved to dismiss the instances. The corporate additionally argued that Ballard waited too lengthy to file go well with.
Bishop, who had a historical past of smoking, diabetes, and hypertension, died from “arteriosclerotic heart problems aggravated by viral pneumonia (Influenza A H1 2009),” based on a Riverside County medical expert’s report made a part of the court docket report. The household disagrees and is arguing that Bishop died from blood clots, a identified complication of surgical procedure. A trial is ready for June 2026.
Terri Bishop, a truck driving teacher who lived in Temecula, California, died Dec. 24, 2022, about three weeks after present process liposuction and a fats switch process at Pacific Liposculpture, an organization with a historical past of run-ins with state regulators.(Janis Hayes)
In Smith’s case, the Los Angeles County medical expert dominated the nurse died of “renal failure of unknown trigger.” The post-mortem report famous: “It is a pure dying since an damage instantly from the surgical procedure can’t be recognized.”
Ballard is demanding additional investigation to unravel what occurred to her mom.
“I don’t suppose they had been easy with the danger and problems that would happen,” Ballard mentioned. “I believe they’re promising folks stuff they’ll’t ship.”
Ballard filed a grievance towards Regenass with the California Medical Board, which the board is investigating, based on paperwork she offered to KFF Well being Information and NBC Information. She believes regulators must be extra clear concerning the backgrounds of surgeons who provide companies to the general public. She additionally hopes the investigation will shake free extra particulars of what occurred to her mom.
“I simply don’t perceive how she got here again to me in a physique bag,” she mentioned.
Issues about gross sales pitches for beauty surgical procedure date again a long time.
Witnesses testifying at a June 1989 congressional listening to held by a subcommittee of the Home Small Enterprise Committee in Washington heard a litany of horror tales of sufferers maimed by surgeons with doubtful coaching and credentials. Subcommittee Chairman Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) mentioned sufferers had been victimized by misleading and false advertisements that promised a “fast, simple and painless technique to change your life — all via the beauty surgical procedure miracle.”
Calling for reform, Wyden added: “So, beauty surgical procedure customers are largely on their very own. It’s again to a purchaser beware market, and it smacks extra of used automobile gross sales than medication.” Wyden now represents Oregon within the U.S. Senate.
All these years later, there’s way more territory to police: an onslaught of online advertising, akin to splashy “earlier than and after” photographs, on-line posts, and podcasts by social media influencers and others courted by surgical procedure corporations in a pricey effort to draw enterprise. Elite Physique Sculpture, as an example, spent $43.9 million in “promoting bills” in 2024. That got here to $3,130 per “buyer acquisition,” based on the corporate’s SEC filings.
Below Federal Commerce Fee tips, medical promoting have to be “truthful, not misleading, and backed up by competent and dependable scientific proof,” based on Janice Kopec of the company’s Bureau of Shopper Safety.
Any claims which can be “instructed or fairly implied” by advertisements additionally have to be correct. That features the “web impression” conveyed by textual content and any charts, graphs, and different photographs, based on the FTC. The company declined to elaborate.
Medical companies are free to resolve what documentation, if any, to share with the general public. Most beauty surgical procedure websites provide little or no such assist for particular claims — akin to restoration instances or ache ranges — on their web sites.
“There is no such thing as a requirement that the substantiation be made accessible to customers, both on a web site or upon demand,” Engle, who can also be a former FTC official, mentioned in an electronic mail.
The legislation permits “puffery,” or boastful statements that no individual would possible take at face worth, or that may’t be proved, akin to, “‘You’ve tried all the remainder, now attempt one of the best,’” Engle mentioned.
The place to attract the road between acceptable boasts and unverified claims may be contentious.
Athēnix, a non-public equity-backed beauty surgical procedure chain with places in six cities, defended its use of phrases akin to “safer” and “higher outcomes” as puffery in response to a false promoting lawsuit filed towards the corporate by Orange County District Legal professional Todd Spitzer in California in August 2022.
Spitzer argued that Athēnix touted its “micro-body-contouring” method as “safer” than conventional liposuction and supplied “excellent outcomes with much less ache and downtime” with out backing that up, based on the go well with.
“There is no such thing as a examine or proof to assist these statements and no scientific consensus about the usage of these new strategies,” Spitzer argued.
The events settled the case in July 2023 when Athēnix agreed to pay $25,000 with out admitting wrongdoing, court docket data present. Earlier than the settlement, Athēnix argued that its use of phrases akin to “safer” and “higher outcomes” was “subjective” and “puffery” — and never false promoting.
Whereas there’s little indication that native or state authorities are stepping up scrutiny of beauty surgical procedure promoting, federal authorities have signaled they intend to crack down on doubtful promoting claims made by drug producers.
In a letter despatched to drug corporations in September, FDA Commissioner Marty Makary wrote that “misleading promoting is unfortunately the present norm” on social media platforms and that the company would now not tolerate these violations.
‘Dangerous Recommendation’
To show medical negligence, injured sufferers typically should present that their care fell beneath what a “fairly prudent” physician with comparable coaching would have offered. Of their protection, surgeons might argue that problems are a danger of any operation and {that a} poor consequence doesn’t imply the physician was negligent.
Some lawsuits filed by injured sufferers add allegations that commercials by surgical procedure chains misled them, or that surgeons failed to completely clarify doable dangers of accidents, a requirement identified in medical circles as knowledgeable consent.
Caitlin Meehan had such a case. She underwent a $15,000 AirSculpt process at Elite Physique Sculpture’s clinic in Wayne, Pennsylvania, exterior Philadelphia. She agreed to the surgical procedure in March 2023, she mentioned, as a result of the corporate’s web site described it as “Lunch Time Lipo,” based on a lawsuit she filed in late August. The go well with alleges that the physician she mentioned the process with “maintained that there are not any critical, life-threatening, lasting and/or everlasting problems,” based on the go well with.
Elite Physique Sculpture promotes its AirSculpt model as “Lunch Time Lipo” with minimal restoration time, based on a lawsuit filed this yr by affected person Caitlin Meehan. The go well with accuses the corporate of false promoting for allegedly minimizing the dangers of the process, allegations the corporate denies. (Screengrabs from “Meehan v. EBS Pennsylvania, PLLC et al.” Courtroom of Widespread Pleas, Philadelphia County)
In the course of the process, nonetheless, gases turned trapped beneath her pores and skin, inflicting a widespread swelling known as subcutaneous emphysema, based on the go well with. Meehan was shocked to see her face, neck, and higher physique severely swollen, inflicting her shortness of breath.
A good friend who drove her to the appointment requested the workers to name an ambulance, however workers members mentioned that wasn’t obligatory, based on the go well with. After an hour’s drive house, Meehan mentioned her pores and skin felt prefer it was burning and she or he known as 911. She spent 4 days within the hospital recovering and stays scarred, based on the go well with. The go well with is pending, and the corporate has but to file a solution in court docket.
Scott Hollenbeck, speedy previous president of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons, mentioned recovering from liposuction in a day “appears unrealistic” given the bruising and swelling that may happen.
“The concept you may return to work 24 hours after efficient liposuction looks as if extraordinarily unhealthy recommendation,” Hollenbeck mentioned.
‘I Felt Horrible’
Advertisements that promised sufferers minimal discomfort even have come below assault in affected person lawsuits.
Greater than 20 different medical malpractice instances reviewed by KFF Well being Information made comparable allegations of surprising ache throughout operations at beauty surgical procedure chains utilizing lidocaine for ache reduction in “awake liposuction.”
One affected person suing Elite Physique Sculpture in Cook dinner County, Illinois, alleged she “was crying as a result of [the] extreme ache” of an operation in September 2023. She alleged the physician mentioned he couldn’t give her any extra native anesthetic and pressed on with the process. The defendants haven’t filed a solution in court docket. The follow didn’t reply to a request for remark.
Engle, the previous FTC official, mentioned that whereas claims of discomfort are considerably subjective, they nonetheless have to be “truthful and substantiated,” akin to supported by a “legitimate, dependable medical examine of sufferers’ expertise.”
NBC Information producer Jason Kane contributed to this report.
