{"id":308044,"date":"2026-02-20T13:08:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-20T13:08:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/308044\/"},"modified":"2026-02-20T13:08:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-20T13:08:08","slug":"medical-tourist-fights-for-compensation-claims-surgery-destroyed-her-stomach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/308044\/","title":{"rendered":"Medical tourist fights for compensation, claims surgery destroyed her stomach"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cIt\u2019s now starting to hit how surreal this whole thing is. I\u2019m scared. I\u2019m not going to lie to you \u2013 I\u2019m really scared. I\u2019m really nervous about it.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m just kind of pushing people away because I don\u2019t want them to worry for me. It really sucks that this has happened to me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Watson paid about $5500 for the operation at the Medicana clinic in Istanbul because she knew she would not get on the public waiting list in New Zealand as she did not have an illness such as diabetes.<\/p>\n

Instead her weight hit 80kg, which in her small frame was classed as obese, after she came off a cocktail of drugs she took for years after a car crash.<\/p>\n

A gastric sleeve operation performed privately in New Zealand could cost $40,000, which was out of her financial reach and why Watson looked overseas.<\/p>\n

\"Manawat\u016bManawat\u016b woman Helen Watson has spent a significant time in hospital since returning from Turkey. Photo \/ Jimmy Ellingham, RNZ<\/p>\n

But now she does not know what life will look like.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know what my body is going to do and how well it\u2019s going to heal or what other complications are going to arise later on. I may not be 100%,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m just sitting on the fence for this and letting my body do what it\u2019s got to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her New Zealand surgeon previously told RNZ it was hard to know exactly what went wrong, but it could be a problem with a staple.<\/p>\n

A statement from Medicana said it categorically denied failures with the surgery.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs documented in the clinical report, the laparoscopic sleeve gastrectomy was performed in accordance with internationally accepted standards, with no intraoperative complications and no evidence of leakage at discharge,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n

\u201cPost-operative follow-up communications indicate the patient initially reported feeling well and did not raise medical concerns until after undergoing procedures at an external facility abroad.\u201d<\/p>\n

Watson denied this, saying she realised straight away something was wrong.<\/a><\/p>\n

But Medicana said when she was discharged there was no clinical evidence of leakage or complications.<\/p>\n

\u201cMedicana does not accept that there is evidence demonstrating surgical error. Medicana stands by the integrity of its surgical and post-operative processes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Medicana said there was no basis for compensation, although it was \u201copen to reviewing any independent medical documentation that may be provided\u201d and to communicating with Watson through \u201cappropriate medical and legal channels to review any new clinical evidence in a professional setting\u201d.<\/p>\n

Medicana representatives were travelling to New Zealand next month for routine business reasons, and Watson said she would like to meet with them.<\/p>\n

She said Medicana had also made legal threats about her speaking out.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a lot of things that need to be fixed. I\u2019d like my money back, absolutely. I\u2019d like my flights [paid for],\u201d Watson said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI even sent them an email asking them for my money back and my flights. My brother-in-law helped me with that letter. Then they came back and said they wanted to sue me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Medicana said it sought legal advice in New Zealand about Watson\u2019s public allegations, but had not initiated legal proceedings.<\/p>\n

Watson had thought about engaging a lawyer in Turkey, but that came at a cost.<\/p>\n

With medical tourism growing, Auckland surgeon Dr Richard Babor said it had reached the point where there was almost always someone in Middlemore Hospital with post-operation problems from overseas surgery.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve seen increasing numbers of people show up on our acute workload here at Middlemore Hospital.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome of them have relatively minor post-operative issues that are easy to sort out. There is a small proportion of them who have quite serious complications from having had surgery, both in Turkey and in Mexico.\u201d<\/p>\n

New Zealand\u2019s system was picking up the pieces when something went wrong, although for most people getting on the public waiting list for weight loss surgery was impossible, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cHere at Middlemore Hospital we do about probably 100 a year, which is a very small number compared to the number of obese people who are in our population, and it\u2019s even quite small compared to the number who are referred to us for surgery.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got quite strict criteria that the patients need to satisfy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Health NZ previously told RNZ about 500 people a year got bariatric surgery through the public system, where aftercare is included.<\/p>\n

Babor said hospitals had been approached by medical tourism organisations to see if they would look after returning patients, but he said this was not possible because of limited resources.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe can\u2019t run a service that does aftercare for some people who are doing surgery in Turkey or Mexico or Thailand or India, or wherever it is.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe would be overwhelmed and we wouldn\u2019t be able to do any surgery on our own patients. We\u2019d just be providing a follow-up service.\u201d<\/p>\n

Babor said no official numbers were kept about people affected by overseas surgery going wrong, but it was something bariatric surgeons talked about and would consider.<\/p>\n

Watson did not use a medical tourism operator, organising her trip to Turkey herself, but growing numbers of people were paying for organised trips.<\/p>\n

Vanessa Warren owned Total Transformation Tours, which took clients to Mexico for bariatric surgery. She said after research, and 20 years of experience in bariatrics, she found a clinic and surgeon with a good reputation and thorough after-surgery care.<\/p>\n

\u201cAny surgery is going to potentially have complications \u2013 whether it\u2019s New Zealand, Mexico, anywhere, there\u2019s potential for complications.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo, one thing I do like about the surgeon that we use is she does a double leak test so that she makes sure that nothing is leaking during surgery and then the day after.\u201d<\/p>\n

Warren encouraged people to research overseas options thoroughly, saying cheaper was not always better.<\/p>\n

Her company provides aftercare for 12 months as part of its package and she accompanies clients on the trips and monitors them after their operations, and wouldn\u2019t take a group greater than five people.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople would definitely prefer to do it in New Zealand, but it\u2019s just not a reality anymore… I do feel very sorry for people who have had bad experiences overseas.\u201d<\/p>\n

Warren said having weight-loss surgery overseas was viewed differently to other operations, such as dental ones.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a very hot topic and everyone has an opinion about it, and there\u2019s a lot of judgment out there for people.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we need to remove a bit of that stigma. We have to be realistic that people can\u2019t afford healthcare in New Zealand, so they are looking overseas.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Accident Compensation Corporation said it might cover treatment injuries from overseas operations if an injury met its criteria, and that any cover was decided on a case-by-case basis.<\/p>\n

\u2013 RNZ<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cIt\u2019s now starting to hit how surreal this whole thing is. I\u2019m scared. I\u2019m not going to lie…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":308045,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[32829,22118,107518,144816,46098,1182,103,397,396,55888,61,60,13938,339,13955,3066,13243],"class_list":{"0":"post-308044","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-healthcare","8":"tag-claims","9":"tag-compensation","10":"tag-destroyed","11":"tag-ellingham","12":"tag-fights","13":"tag-for","14":"tag-health","15":"tag-health-care","16":"tag-healthcare","17":"tag-her","18":"tag-ie","19":"tag-ireland","20":"tag-jimmy","21":"tag-medical","22":"tag-stomach","23":"tag-surgery","24":"tag-tourist"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/308044","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=308044"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/308044\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/308045"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=308044"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=308044"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=308044"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}