Everyone gets a little work done here and there these days. Plastic surgery can cost a pretty penny so one man came up with a way to save money that ultimately led him to the emergency room.
A Brazilian man tried using super glue and DIY YouTube tutorials to perform a rhinoplasty on himself that went horribly wrong. He ended up at the Campo Limpo Emergency Care Unit with an infected wound. The reasoning behind the infection was that he did not use any gloves to perform the procedure and didn’t clean the wound to ensure his stitches wouldn’t open. Big mistake.
The man informed doctors that he got the idea to do his own plastic surgery on YouTube. The videos he watched recommended that he used rubbing alcohol to disinfect the area and a veterinary anesthetic to numb the pain. He then used self-absorbing thread and superglue to close the wound once he completed his “operation.”
The hospital released a statement that read: “His sheet clarifies that, after being welcomed by the mental health medical team, the patient underwent care by the oral and maxillofacial team (BMF), which carried out the cleaning of the wound, dressing and guidance on the necessary care. The patient was discharged from the hospital on the same day, in addition to being referred for a return visit with the BMF specialty.”
Doctors have always warned that such amateur surgical procedures can turn out way worse than expected and could even result in death. Since this patient’s case, the Brazilian Society of Plastic Surgery (SBCP) has published a statement clarifying that rhinoplasty “in addition to being an exclusively medical act, requires specialization and qualifications to perform.”