State Senate Advances 5 Bills Regulating Cosmetic Surgery

Carmen Sandino thought that cosmetic surgery in a doctor’s office would give her “Marilyn Monroe legs.” What she got was gangrene, a hospital stay and the near loss of both limbs.

“For three days they kept me next to the surgery room,” she told a state Senate committee.

Doctors were able to save her legs, Sandino said, but the calf implants left her with scars and loss of feeling in her legs. “The implants were too large and they damaged my nerves,” she said.

Sandino, of Walnut Creek, was the star witness at a hearing Monday on five bills designed to give patients greater protection when they have cosmetic procedures.

The legislation was prompted in part by the 1997 post-liposuction death of Judy Fernandez of La Habra.

All five measures were approved by the Business and Professions Committee and now go to the Senate Appropriations Committee.

The bills--three by Sen. Liz Figueroa (D-Fremont) and two by Sen. Jackie Speier (D-Daly City)--would increase training disclosure requirements for physicians who perform cosmetic surgery and would regulate their ads. They also would limit the types of procedures that could be performed in outpatient facilities.

California medical licenses do not limit the types of procedures that physicians can perform, said Robert del Junco, an Orange County physician and a consultant to the state Medical Board.

“A general practitioner in one week could convert to a plastic surgeon,” he said.

The death rate for liposuction is as high as one in 5,000 nationwide, according to a Senate analysis of the bills.

One of Figueroa’s bills would allow potential patients to use the Internet to get information about a physician who performs cosmetic surgery, including the doctor’s training and any disciplinary actions taken against that physician.