POSTED UNDER Mommy Makeover Reviews
DO NOT Use This Practice! You Will Be in for a Nightmare and Excruciating Pain
ORIGINAL POST
DO NOT Use This Practice! You Will Be in for a Nightmare and Excruciating Pain
I should have went with my gut feeling when I started having communication problems in July. Once I paid my deposit, that was the last time that I got clear communication. My pre-surgery coordinator changed three times with noone contacting me to tell me. I found out because I'd call trying to get a response and would be told they were not my coordinator anymore. They DO NOT respond to emails. They are not proactive in any way. They do not listen when you tell them what you need. Fast forward to surgery. It was the day before my pre-op appt and I did not have an appt time. They have a walk-in window from 9-12 for pre-op. At the last minute,d they scheduled an appt time of 8:30 but no one was even at the desk until 9 am. They told me I'd have a call telling me surgery time around 4-5 pm. That time came and went, I called several times checking in, and finally at 6:30 they called. I had a 10:30 am arrival time. The day of surgery was the biggest nightmare of all. I arrived on time at 10:30. It was almost an hour before I was in a room. I sat in that room for 2 hours before anyone came in to talk to me at all. So it is now 1:30. Doc finally comes in. I still don't have an IV or anything. Anesthesia came in around 2. Started the IV. I wake up from surgery SCREAMING in pain. I was shivering and trying not to vomit from the pain. I was begging someone to help me. The Anesthesiologist screamed at me SHUT UP, SHUT UP! Told me to "shut up or I'm going to intubate you. Is that what you want?" I was terrified at this point. The nurse just sat there and ignored me when I said I had to use the restroom. I asked to see the doctor and she told me he was not there. I said, can someone call him, or is there an NP here that I can see? She told me she didn't know what to tell me. I asked where the nearest ER was as I'm an out of town patient. Told her I was going to go there so that they could bring the pain level under control. She said that she didn't know where it was and giggled at me. I said, "you don't know where the nearest hospitals are? What if there were complications? What would you do?" Nothing. My daughter had been in the parking lot for hours with no communication. When I found out she was there I told them I just wanted to go so I could get to the ER. It took them another 30 min to get me out the door. I was in the worst pain I have ever been in in my life. I've had some seriously painful surgeries and injuries in my life and NOTHING touches the pain that this left me in. As I was getting in the car I said, I'm bleeding somewhere. I can feel it all over me. The nurse said no you just peed yourself. I was SURE that I hadn't. Upon arrival at the ER I found that I was correct. I was in fact bleeding out of one of the drain holes. My entire bottom was covered in blood, my skirt was soaked and thankfully there was a towel under me in the car or I'd have stained the rental car in blood. I asked when I was leaving when was my follow up as I was told that there was a 1 day follow up and a 1 week follow up. They told me to check my email. It would be in there. This was after 8 pm at night.
Avana wrote me a script for Norco which is all over my records as a drug allergy. I am glad I asked before she sent me on my way with it. She went back inside to get a new prescription. If the doctor wasn't there, How could she have done that? I went to Mount Sinai ER and by the time I got there I was in so much pain I almost couldn't breathe enough to even tell them what was wrong. They got the pain under control so that I could manage from there with oral meds. They helped get me cleaned up from the blood and helped stop the bleeding. Thank god for them. I don't know what I'd have done otherwise.
I went for my follow up the next day. Was there for over an hour for some random staff to look at my incision. No seeing the doctor. The NP in the room could not tell me what the dr found when he went in for explant. Noone could tell me the volume of tissue that was taken out, etc. All questions that I came prepared to ask my doctor. They told me I could wait and try to catch him between surgeries but that he was very busy and usually does not see patients for this. I was not happy but I asked for a call to schedule a time to see him between now and the time I had to leave. No such appt was ever made. I called yesterday several times to schedule an appt to see the doc to discuss/remove my drains. I leave to fly home first thing tomorrow morning. I called as late as 6 pm last night and they said they had me on the list to call. No such call ever came. Today, my last day in Miami, I still have drains that I don't know how to remove. I don't have an appt. I missed the call today by 10 seconds because I couldn't get to the phone fast enough and tried to call back immediately. Of course, as usual, no one is available to talk to me. That has been the case the entire time. I should NEVER have proceeded with surgery with this place. The doctor may be very talented but the staff is a literal nightmare. You will leave with nothing but questions and trauma. Stay away from this place. Even the ER said they are not reputable and that I'm not the first patient they have seen in this shape after leaving here. When I told the ER staff where I went, their faces all just fell and they put their heads down. That should say a lot about this "surgery center". Nothing but a hellacious experience. Spare yourself the pain and emotional trauma and go somewhere else.
Avana wrote me a script for Norco which is all over my records as a drug allergy. I am glad I asked before she sent me on my way with it. She went back inside to get a new prescription. If the doctor wasn't there, How could she have done that? I went to Mount Sinai ER and by the time I got there I was in so much pain I almost couldn't breathe enough to even tell them what was wrong. They got the pain under control so that I could manage from there with oral meds. They helped get me cleaned up from the blood and helped stop the bleeding. Thank god for them. I don't know what I'd have done otherwise.
I went for my follow up the next day. Was there for over an hour for some random staff to look at my incision. No seeing the doctor. The NP in the room could not tell me what the dr found when he went in for explant. Noone could tell me the volume of tissue that was taken out, etc. All questions that I came prepared to ask my doctor. They told me I could wait and try to catch him between surgeries but that he was very busy and usually does not see patients for this. I was not happy but I asked for a call to schedule a time to see him between now and the time I had to leave. No such appt was ever made. I called yesterday several times to schedule an appt to see the doc to discuss/remove my drains. I leave to fly home first thing tomorrow morning. I called as late as 6 pm last night and they said they had me on the list to call. No such call ever came. Today, my last day in Miami, I still have drains that I don't know how to remove. I don't have an appt. I missed the call today by 10 seconds because I couldn't get to the phone fast enough and tried to call back immediately. Of course, as usual, no one is available to talk to me. That has been the case the entire time. I should NEVER have proceeded with surgery with this place. The doctor may be very talented but the staff is a literal nightmare. You will leave with nothing but questions and trauma. Stay away from this place. Even the ER said they are not reputable and that I'm not the first patient they have seen in this shape after leaving here. When I told the ER staff where I went, their faces all just fell and they put their heads down. That should say a lot about this "surgery center". Nothing but a hellacious experience. Spare yourself the pain and emotional trauma and go somewhere else.
angie4694's provider
Replies (5)
Wow, I am so sorry to hear of all of this happening to you. However, I really do thank you for sharing your story. We really do need to know what sort of things can happen and how we might handle it. Now I know to ask if my surgeon has insurance, I assumed it was required. Also will check to see if I’ll be dealing with a different staff at the surgical center than the office. Best of luck moving forward.
Who was you doctor if you don’t mind me asking
omg that's awful who was your dr?
For those that asked. It was Dr Mameniskis. It was originally supposed to be Moradian and he never seemed to actually be available. I've seen numerous people complain of the same thing.
The stiches never dissolved (the ones that were actually in there that is and didn't come flying out when the incisions opened up) because silk suture does not dissolve. That was apparently used as well because it had to be fished out as it exposed itself. I know I don't have a silkworm in my boobs lol. Wound care was appalled at what they were finding in there.
I'm at 7 mos post op. My belly button STILL is not healed. It still weeps constantly and it is PAINFUL. At the 3 month mark I started having constant, sharp burning pain in one of my breasts. My entire abdomen from the rib cage down is extremely painful. I cannot tolerate laying on my stomach or even leaning against anything lightly. It feels like I've been beaten with a bat. My incision is SO horribly disfigured and I have mass amounts of calcified tissue between my belly button and pubic bone. My top and bottom half doesn't match where he put me together. It looks like he put a much smaller bottom on a much larger top. I had a consult with two local plastic surgeons here locally and they were horrified. I saw one while it was at its worst immediately post op and the other I saw first a couple of months ago.
The left side of my upper abdomen appears as if the abdominal wall repair did not hold. It felt like it was tearing apart after surgery but months later it still feels that way and feels very soft unlike other parts. My waist looks like he basically stitched one side up and didn't do the other one. It's so horrible. My implants don't even look like I had a lift at all despite the massive scarring to say otherwise. They roll under my armpits. Implants shouldn't move at all. They are flat and saggy. I paid alot of money for NOTHING. It's going to cost me another 10k out of pocket at least to fix this disaster.
I recall also when they started the IV, they used a needle that looked similar to what I have donated blood with, they put it immediately into the bend of my elbow which should always be a last resort. Anesthesia likes it in the hand or as distal as possible because if you lose the vein they can move up the arm. When I had to have blood drawn there, they stuck me with the same very large needle that was long, large gauge and rigid vs the butterfly setup that nearly every hospital and lab uses for blood collection. They stuck me 5 times in my hand with that needle and never did get the blood. I wound up paying for it out of pocket locally because they couldn't get it done nor did they have any kind of proper blood collection supplies.
Anyone considering this place should run far and run fast unless you want to be disfigured and possibly die.
The stiches never dissolved (the ones that were actually in there that is and didn't come flying out when the incisions opened up) because silk suture does not dissolve. That was apparently used as well because it had to be fished out as it exposed itself. I know I don't have a silkworm in my boobs lol. Wound care was appalled at what they were finding in there.
I'm at 7 mos post op. My belly button STILL is not healed. It still weeps constantly and it is PAINFUL. At the 3 month mark I started having constant, sharp burning pain in one of my breasts. My entire abdomen from the rib cage down is extremely painful. I cannot tolerate laying on my stomach or even leaning against anything lightly. It feels like I've been beaten with a bat. My incision is SO horribly disfigured and I have mass amounts of calcified tissue between my belly button and pubic bone. My top and bottom half doesn't match where he put me together. It looks like he put a much smaller bottom on a much larger top. I had a consult with two local plastic surgeons here locally and they were horrified. I saw one while it was at its worst immediately post op and the other I saw first a couple of months ago.
The left side of my upper abdomen appears as if the abdominal wall repair did not hold. It felt like it was tearing apart after surgery but months later it still feels that way and feels very soft unlike other parts. My waist looks like he basically stitched one side up and didn't do the other one. It's so horrible. My implants don't even look like I had a lift at all despite the massive scarring to say otherwise. They roll under my armpits. Implants shouldn't move at all. They are flat and saggy. I paid alot of money for NOTHING. It's going to cost me another 10k out of pocket at least to fix this disaster.
I recall also when they started the IV, they used a needle that looked similar to what I have donated blood with, they put it immediately into the bend of my elbow which should always be a last resort. Anesthesia likes it in the hand or as distal as possible because if you lose the vein they can move up the arm. When I had to have blood drawn there, they stuck me with the same very large needle that was long, large gauge and rigid vs the butterfly setup that nearly every hospital and lab uses for blood collection. They stuck me 5 times in my hand with that needle and never did get the blood. I wound up paying for it out of pocket locally because they couldn't get it done nor did they have any kind of proper blood collection supplies.
Anyone considering this place should run far and run fast unless you want to be disfigured and possibly die.
I saw the surgeon finally right before heading to the airport to go home on Day 6. I was concerned about the way the fluid was collecting at the bottom of my incision. I was concerned about the abdominal binder digging into my incision as it felt like it was tearing. I was told I just needed more time for it to drain even though I really didn’t have a lot of output in the drains anymore and it was just that gravity was taking its toll. They said everything looked good. I was concerned about my drains because the left one was VERY sore, red and the bottom part of the drain was pulling out and the suture holding it in place was unwinding. I also expressed concern that the bra was too loose. It wasn’t supporting anything at all and it was I’ll fitting with the band digging into the incision under my boob. My implants were supposed to be high and perky with full cleavage. They have more of a slope to them and they still move quite a bit laterally which was something that was supposed to be fixed. I was told it was fine and didn’t need anymore support. Past experience with my original breast aug told me that was not the case. It was just a regular sports bra I could buy at Walmart. They charged me $143 for my compression garments. I’ve located those same garments elsewhere for $30 total. I asked how long before the sutures should dissolve, they said 3 weeks Max.
They were apologetic about what had happened post op but that doesn’t change the fact that it seems to be standard practice based on what I can see in other reviews.
I left that appt and got on a plane to go home. During the wait at the airport and the flight, my legs swelled up twice their size despite me getting up to walk around about 5 min every 30 min. Even on the plane. That finally calmed after a day.
The following day was my 1 week mark. I spiked a fever. Drain site was hot, red and painful. Went to the ER. My labs looked pretty rough. I had an infection at the site of the drain. There were large hard knots where Lipo was performed and the entire length of the drain that was infected. They assisted in removing them. Sutures were both unwound and nothing was really holding the drain in place. The knots still have not gone away or lessened. ER doc sent me out with a new round of antibiotics. I had been on Keflex since the day of surgery. Started Clindamycin. For the next week i continued to have a ton of nasty infected drainage but fever stayed away. I began to be concerned even more about my incision. It looked like it was starting to pull apart, felt like it was in several places. My incisions on my boobs also were starting to come apart where it all meets in the middle from the inverted T lift. It was no longer nearly together, there was about 1/2 inch gap starting to form. At this point I have been in the binder and bra they sent me home in full time only removing to take a shower and briefly every other day to wash the garments.
Fast forward to last Tuesday. 12 day mark. I’m getting dressed after showering and my better half notices not only does the incision look really bad but there is a literal hole. A two once section of my abdominal incision had come apart. I could see my fascia. There was angry, bloody discharge coming from it. it wasn’t gaping like that when I looked at it prior to showering. I had put steri strips on it the day before because it was draining so much from that site it and it looked like it was needing some wound support, they didn’t hold.
I have been diligent about washing the area with antibacterial soap (dial AND Hibiclens) cool showers, washing only gently with my fingertips so as not to be too rough with it. I have had quite a few surgeries in my life and have never had a complication. I’m quite knowledgeable in proper surgical wound care thanks to those experiences.
I went to the ER again to have them provide some wound care. I expected to be packed, stitched, or some other sort of wound care/closure and be sent on my way. They looked at it and cringed. By the time I got to the ER another spot on each side had started to pull apart. Those were wider laterally but more shallow and not as wide vertically. There was a lot of exudate in those spots as well as the incisions under my breasts. There was already some necrosis happening at the larger site. My labs were horrible. WBC sky high, RBC way too low, platelets high, CRP was 93. Normal is 3. Even at my worst flare of my chronic health issues, the highest it has ever been was 41 and that was with pneumonia. SED rate was 65. Normal high end is 20. The highest that has ever been was 30. Most everything in all of the tests were in a danger zone. There was indication of severe muscle injury. CT indicated a large seroma that had formed since my last ER visit. It also indicated I was told the necrosis was probably aided by the fact that the abdominal binder was ill fitting and folding along the incision line cutting off proper blood flow (as I’d been concerned it would when I went for my 1 week post op and asked about it.) I also now had excruciating pain where the drain had been. It felt like I was ripping apart with the slightest shift in position.
I was admitted to the hospital and was put on Vancomycin and Zosyn via IV for the next three days. Countless bags of fluids. Wound care came in to debride, pack and dress the wound. Inflammatory markers and WBC were coming down satisfactorily. I developed a hard painful spot to the right of my belly button on Friday, exactly 15 days post op. Several hours after onset, that knot burst and for 10 solid minutes, bloody pus and bloody serum POURED out of the hole in my incision like a faucet. Hard knot no longer hurt. Got cleaned up, wound redressed, labs after switching to oral meds were satisfactory and I got to go home with orders to follow up with wound care. They will be my new best friends until this is healed.
Today is day 20. Almost 3 weeks. I still have a gaping hole and two smaller ones. Still have nasty exudate under my boobs and the buried sutures are palpable. I had another burst of fluid soak my clothes yesterday though not as bad as the first and no pus this time. I’m on three oral antibiotics which gave way to hell for my lady bits. I see wound care in the morning for them to debride again and decide if we need to change the type of dressing or what. The incisions around my nipple while not infected are not healing evenly. I have holes where some of the sutures are that will have to fill in. All sutures should largely be gone by now but they are still very much there as are the ones in my belly button that also has a bunch of exudate we have to keep cleaning. I assume wound care will have to remove them at some point which should be nice and painful after 3 weeks.
I’ve followed post op instructions to the T and still have this going on. I ALMOST bought some different compression garments that fit better but decided not to go against what the doc had given me. I do take biologics regularly but I stopped them over 3 weeks before surgery and still haven’t resumed because of the healing issues. Normally I hold them two weeks prior and resume pretty much right after surgery and have had no issues doing that in my entire life. Not even with a very invasive knee procedure with a 5 inch long incision.
I get it that seromas can happen with tummy tucks BUT I have been to a hospital 3 times since the day of surgery. I’ve had what could have been life threatening complications had I not trusted my gut and went to the ER last week to let the pros handle it. I will heal eventually and I will have some really gnarly scars from it unfortunately but oh well. Just hoping that once it’s all healed and enough time has passed for the swelling to recede that I don’t look deformed. Also hoping my implants don’t bottom out immediately.
Admittedly as an out of town patient, I did not call the surgeon about any of this. There was no point. I didn’t get adequate support or communication while I was there so I don’t expect it now that I’m home. I couldn’t ever seem to get a consult when I needed it or even get through to the right person even the day after surgery. The staff sent me out the day of surgery soaked in blood from an active bleed and in horrid pain without hesitation. The day following surgery when I went for follow up I wasn’t able to see the doctor and was instead seen by office staff whose medical credentials I don’t have any evidence of. I don’t expect any kind of real direction or support now.
Between the way I was treated the day of surgery and everything that has happened since I would not advise ANYONE to deal with this place. It isn’t worth it. Not the pain, frustration for lack of organization or communication or the potential consequences if there are complications. You will be 100% on your own if there are any especially since they have you sign a paper indicating that the surgeon does not carry malpractice insurance as is allowed in Florida. I will heal. I just hope this experience is not repeated for others.