Surgical Complications Kill High School Girl

IdahoMom

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While I think that it's very sad this girl lost her life, I think the underlying story here is that hundreds of thousand of young women are surgically altering their appearances....and some of these young women are still in high school. Why not wait awhile before having surgery?

eta: I ran across another article after posting this that said this was corrective surgery

Heads up: the headline will undoubtedly make some cringe because of the cheerleader reference. I remember past stories that posters objected to because of references to being a cheerleader (I didn't write the headline, lol).

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/localnews/content/south/epaper/2008/03/25/m1a_cheerleader_0324.html

Breast-surgery complications kill West Boca High cheerleader

snip

Stephanie Kuleba had a charmed life: captain of the varsity cheerleading squad at West Boca High, a nearly perfect grade-point average, good looks and a ticket to the University of Florida, where she would start her journey toward becoming a medical doctor.
Her friends said she was "perfect," so when Kuleba died Saturday of complications from breast augmentation surgery, none of them could understand how the girl whose success in life "was a sure thing" could perish in such a strange and devastating fashion.
"She was a role model for a lot of people," said friend and classmate Vicky Goldring, 16. "She was incredibly smart. She wanted to help people. She was just a happy 18-year-old girl."
While no official cause of death was released by authorities or Kuleba's family, many of her friends said she suffered a severe reaction to anesthesia given to her during a breast augmentation procedure Friday night.
Paramedics were called to an outpatient surgery center at 1905 Clint Moore Road in Boca Raton and rushed Kuleba to Delray Medical Center, where she died Saturday...
...In recent years, doctors have performed an increasing number of procedures such as breast implants, liposuction and tummy tucks on young women and even girls as young as 14.
The enormous popularity of reality TV shows like Extreme Makeover have fueled the desire of adolescent girls to alter their bodies permanently, and they are finding more surgeons willing to oblige them. Breast implants and liposuction are now bestowed by parents as graduation or birthday gifts. Some doctors say they have performed breast augmentations on Baby Boomer mothers and their teenage daughters.
From 2002 to 2003, according to the American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery, the number of women and girls 18 and younger who got breast implants nearly tripled, from 3,872 to 11,326.
Among all age groups, cosmetic implants have skyrocketed in popularity, according to the American Society of Plastic Surgeons.
Last year, according to the ASPS, about 247,000 women got implants for augmentation, compared with 32,000 in 1992.

------------------------


http://www.ourbodiesourselves.org/book/companion.asp?id=1&compID=102

snip


Plastic Surgery in a Developing Teen

One of the concerns about plastic surgery on adolescents is that their bodies are still maturing. In addition to development that may occur in the late teens, growth charts indicate that the average girl gains weight between the ages of 18 and 21, and that is likely to change her desire or need for breast augmentation as well as liposuction. There are no epidemiological studies or clinical trials on the safety and long-term risks of these procedures for adolescents. Although the FDA approved saline breast implants for women ages 18 and older,3 it is legal for physicians to perform breast augmentation for anyone under 18 as an “off-label” use, and the number of teens 18 and younger undergoing breast augmentation tripled from 2002 to 2003. It was not until December 2004 that the American Society of Plastic Surgeons stated an official position against breast augmentation for patients under 18.
 
i am torn about this. she was 18 so it was her choice. her family and friends are saying it is private so we do not know why she wanted the surgery. a good bra can hide deformed breast but for the woman that lives with them there is no place to hide. she would have faced the same risk with dental surgery. it will still be to make her look better but she would face less judgement. we want to raise our kids to accept themselves for who they are then we need to look in the mirror. we spend millions on make-up, hair dye, and face creams. not to mention the diet industry!. we do not like the way we look so we fight it. this girl just took it a step further. if her breats were normal i would have told her it was not worth the risk but if 1 was larger than the other i can not say. my SIL had this problem and it ate at her self esteem until she had the surgery at 25.
 
i am torn about this. she was 18 so it was her choice. her family and friends are saying it is private so we do not know why she wanted the surgery. a good bra can hide deformed breast but for the woman that lives with them there is no place to hide. she would have faced the same risk with dental surgery. it will still be to make her look better but she would face less judgement. we want to raise our kids to accept themselves for who they are then we need to look in the mirror. we spend millions on make-up, hair dye, and face creams. not to mention the diet industry!. we do not like the way we look so we fight it. this girl just took it a step further. if her breats were normal i would have told her it was not worth the risk but if 1 was larger than the other i can not say. my SIL had this problem and it ate at her self esteem until she had the surgery at 25.

I agree with all you said...the thing that staggered me when reading the article, as I said in my first post, is the fact that so many teenage girls are getting implants these days- I think that most are for vanity purposes and not necessarily to correct "defects", for lack of a better word. I think the reason for that is that some segments of our society's standard of what a breast should look like is: OO.
 
(Let me reiterate that my concern is about girls that are doing this at such a young age for vanity reasons, not corrective)

http://www.ourbodiesourselves.org/book/companion.asp?id=1&compID=102

Teen Self-Consciousness and Plastic Surgery


Teens expect that plastic surgery will improve their self-confidence, but does it? There are no empirical studies examining the long-term benefits among adolescents. One study found that body-image satisfaction improved after cosmetic surgery, but so did satisfaction among the control group, suggesting that improved body image may occur with increasing age, regardless of whether the patient undergoes plastic surgery.8 In fact, a longitudinal study that followed adolescents from age 11 to 18 found body image satisfaction rates were highest at age 18 in both sexes and that the satisfaction of individual participants varied as a function of their age and developmental stage.9 This indicates that many adolescents who are very dissatisfied with their appearance will feel more satisfied a few years later, whether or not they undergo surgery. The same study also found that the physical features with which participants were most dissatisfied reflected culturally determined stereotypes of idealized attributes emphasized in books, mass media, and advertisements.
Research indicating that breast augmentation patients are 4 times as likely to commit suicide compared to other plastic surgery patients10 raises questions about the mental health of the women who choose implants and the psychological benefits of the surgery. Liposuction is also of particular concern because of its association with eating disorders. The average onset of body dysmorphic disorder (BDD), defined as “a preoccupation with an imagined or slight defect in appearance that leads to significant impairment in functioning,” is 16 years of age.11 However, since the goal of cosmetic surgery is to improve and transform appearance, it may be difficult to distinguish between this desire and a pathological preoccupation.12
 
My girlfriend's daughter last winter had corrective surgery on her breast. One was waaay smaller than the other and her self esteem and self imagine REALY suffered because of it. She's was only 16 years old at the time. I've seen the difference it has made in her life. She had it done at Children's Hospital in Philadelphia.

Now she even will wear a bathing suit and go swimming! The summer before she would not even wear a summer shirt! Her mom even bought her very expensive silicon false breast thingys...( You have to buy two, even though she only needed one)

I don't agree with getting a child breast augmentation just for the sake of bigger *advertiser censored*, but deformities are different.

Poor kid:(
 
There was an article in our local paper about a year ago on this subject. Some of the girls they interviewed...well, let's just kindly say they are exactly like you would imagine. One girl was quoted as saying that she just skimmed the release form before signing it because she "didn't want to get grossed out." Like, OMG! Totally!

Where the hell are their parents? Because you can say that they are 18 all day long, but they sure as hell don't have the cash for this. (Unless they are stripping or something, which is its own issue.) It is an expensive procedure, even if you can get it partially covered by insurance somehow.

I feel terrible for this girl and her family. I lived in Boca when I was 14-18 years old, and it is a high pressure area for being "perfect." The kids there live in a bubble that is so far from reality. One girl at my high school drove a DeLorean! The clothes, the cars, the drugs, the parties, the money - it was unbelievable. And for a "normal" kid with parents who are not just normal but seriously protective like mine...it was a challenge to fit in.

It is sad that a girl with so much going for her felt the need to do one more thing to be "perfect." I'll bet her family and friends thought she was perfect the way she was.
 
There was an article in our local paper about a year ago on this subject. Some of the girls they interviewed...well, let's just kindly say they are exactly like you would imagine. One girl was quoted as saying that she just skimmed the release form before signing it because she "didn't want to get grossed out." Like, OMG! Totally!

Where the hell are their parents? Because you can say that they are 18 all day long, but they sure as hell don't have the cash for this. (Unless they are stripping or something, which is its own issue.) It is an expensive procedure, even if you can get it partially covered by insurance somehow.

I feel terrible for this girl and her family. I lived in Boca when I was 14-18 years old, and it is a high pressure area for being "perfect." The kids there live in a bubble that is so far from reality. One girl at my high school drove a DeLorean! The clothes, the cars, the drugs, the parties, the money - it was unbelievable. And for a "normal" kid with parents who are not just normal but seriously protective like mine...it was a challenge to fit in.

It is sad that a girl with so much going for her felt the need to do one more thing to be "perfect." I'll bet her family and friends thought she was perfect the way she was.
depends on where you live how much it cost. my SIL paid 3k. at 18 she lived at home but had a job. she probably had more money to waste than i do.
 
(Let me reiterate that my concern is about girls that are doing this at such a young age for vanity reasons, not corrective)
12


I agree with you. To assume otherwise when friends reported her to be perfect in every way imo is enabling the rest of society that seeks perfecting that is only attainable under a knife. I will assume it was strictly vanity, or insecurity, based on the "personal decision" her family spoke of rather than any medical reason . But I don't agree that breasts should look like Mr. Magoos glasses :crazy:
 
My daughter needs breast reduction surgery but shes only 15, the doctor reccoommended we wait till she is 18, doc said she might not be done growing. But if we could do it now I would, I hate that she is so self consious of being so big in the bossom, she wears sweat shirts all the time to try to stay covered. Its so hard to watch her go through the embarrassment.
 
It bothers me that these girls are doing this so young. Some of them will want to have children some day and there are so many hormonal changes to the breasts during a pregnancy. I am not sure how the implants would affect this, but it seems to me it would. I just hate to see them making changes to their bodies so young that may affect their future. What seems so important now may not seem so important ten years down the road.
 
My daughter needs breast reduction surgery but shes only 15, the doctor reccoommended we wait till she is 18, doc said she might not be done growing. But if we could do it now I would, I hate that she is so self consious of being so big in the bossom, she wears sweat shirts all the time to try to stay covered. Its so hard to watch her go through the embarrassment.
My sister and a friend had the procedure and both of them had their breasts grow huge again. There are no guarantees
 
i am torn about this. she was 18 so it was her choice. her family and friends are saying it is private so we do not know why she wanted the surgery. a good bra can hide deformed breast but for the woman that lives with them there is no place to hide. she would have faced the same risk with dental surgery. it will still be to make her look better but she would face less judgement. we want to raise our kids to accept themselves for who they are then we need to look in the mirror. we spend millions on make-up, hair dye, and face creams. not to mention the diet industry!. we do not like the way we look so we fight it. this girl just took it a step further. if her breats were normal i would have told her it was not worth the risk but if 1 was larger than the other i can not say. my SIL had this problem and it ate at her self esteem until she had the surgery at 25.

Important point. This is a very rare anesthesia complication, and could have happened to her for knee surgery, oral surgery, breast biopsy, etc. The sensationalism around this poor girl wanting to have symmetrical breasts is simply because the word "breast" is involved, especially with the word "cheerleader". Try it with reconstructive jaw surgery, skin graft over a burn, or reduction of a complex ankle fracture in overweight mid-level manager and see how that sells.

Most everybody here has been quite sensitive to her condition, and the difference between her procedure for what is basically a deformity, and one for augmentation alone.

This is a medical tragedy, not a moral object lesson and I feel for her, her family, and her friends, who held her in high esteem.

c6
 
Important point. This is a very rare anesthesia complication, and could have happened to her for knee surgery, oral surgery, breast biopsy, etc.

True, but unbeknown to her Kuleba was running an unnecessary risk. My sister is an anesthesiologist and she's very critical of surgical procedures requiring general anesthesia being performed in outpatient clinics especially on patients that have never received general anesthesia before. In most cases these clinics are not equipped to deal with possible complications that would require reviving a patient having a severe adverse reaction to an anesthetic, this would require a hospital setting. Transferring a patient in critical condition from a clinic to a hospital for treatment is time-consuming and transport by itself can be fatal to the patient. In many cases these clinics do not employ anesthesiologists because they don't want to pay a physician's fee where states allow for specially trained nurses to perform certain anesthesiology procedures. Unfortunately neither the anesthesiology nurse nor the surgeon are trained to revive patients, this has to be done an anesthesiologist, who is a physician trained to deal with such emergencies. If the surgery takes place at a hospital there will usually be two anesthesiologists in attendance: a fully-licensed physician and a resident, plus all the revival equipment and SICU resources required.
 
My BFF want to have breast implants. I have been 100% supportive until I read this.
 
True, but unbeknown to her Kuleba was running an unnecessary risk. My sister is an anesthesiologist and she's very critical of surgical procedures requiring general anesthesia being performed in outpatient clinics especially on patients that have never received general anesthesia before. In most cases these clinics are not equipped to deal with possible complications that would require reviving a patient having a severe adverse reaction to an anesthetic, this would require a hospital setting. Transferring a patient in critical condition from a clinic to a hospital for treatment is time-consuming and transport by itself can be fatal to the patient. In many cases these clinics do not employ anesthesiologists because they don't want to pay a physician's fee where states allow for specially trained nurses to perform certain anesthesiology procedures. Unfortunately neither the anesthesiology nurse nor the surgeon are trained to revive patients, this has to be done an anesthesiologist, who is a physician trained to deal with such emergencies. If the surgery takes place at a hospital there will usually be two anesthesiologists in attendance: a fully-licensed physician and a resident, plus all the revival equipment and SICU resources required.

I fully agree with your sister. Malignant hyperthermia takes at least two MDs and an anesthetist to manage. Hospitals are much safer, and the time to transfer from a clinic is critical.

c6
 
True, but unbeknown to her Kuleba was running an unnecessary risk. My sister is an anesthesiologist and she's very critical of surgical procedures requiring general anesthesia being performed in outpatient clinics especially on patients that have never received general anesthesia before. In most cases these clinics are not equipped to deal with possible complications that would require reviving a patient having a severe adverse reaction to an anesthetic, this would require a hospital setting. Transferring a patient in critical condition from a clinic to a hospital for treatment is time-consuming and transport by itself can be fatal to the patient. In many cases these clinics do not employ anesthesiologists because they don't want to pay a physician's fee where states allow for specially trained nurses to perform certain anesthesiology procedures. Unfortunately neither the anesthesiology nurse nor the surgeon are trained to revive patients, this has to be done an anesthesiologist, who is a physician trained to deal with such emergencies. If the surgery takes place at a hospital there will usually be two anesthesiologists in attendance: a fully-licensed physician and a resident, plus all the revival equipment and SICU resources required.

You are so right. i have a friend who is a Respitory Therapist and she has told me over and over how important it is for anyone undergoing anethesia that where they have it done has proper rescuitation equipment, people who know how to handle emergencies, etc.
In 30 yrs, she has seen it all.
Ths is very sad to happen to this young girl. :(
I know someone who just this week scheduled breast reduction surgery and was shocked to find out it will be outpatient procedure! This seems serious surgery and would think they'd be safer in a Hospital for a couple of days afterwards for Professionals to look after her.
 
Here is a link of the girl's family being interviewed on the "Today Show". They are all saying she was having surgery to correct a birth defect, not a "boob job".

I wonder if she had a third nipple, as they say it was always there. I have heard that an embryo sometimes starts to split, but doesn't and the baby will have an extra nipple.

http://video.msn.com/?mkt=en-us&vid...b22-b2b797bf66f3&from=MSNHP&tab=m17&GT1=28114

Tammie in Miami
 

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