29-year-old West Virginia woman dies while undergoing Brazilian butt lift in Miami

A failed Brazilian butt lift caused the death of a 29-year-old West Virginia woman on Thursday. Heather Meadows, the patient, died of fat clogs in her heart and lungs.

Meadows underwent the Brazilian butt lift at the Encore Plastic Surgery in Hialeah, reports Miami-Dade Medical Examiner. The procedure involves performing liposuction on the torso and then injecting the fat removed into the buttocks.

The medical examiner’s office listed the primary cause of death of Meadows to fat particles clogging her lungs and heart, causing organ failure. It also listed complications from a lipid transfer as a secondary cause of death. It is believed that fat particles killed the woman because the fat entered her bloodstream through a vein during the fat transfer procedure.

Meadows has a six-year-old son and a newborn daughter, now orphaned by the botched procedure. Health Services identifies the surgeon as Dr Osakatukei Omulepu whose license had previously been revoked by authorities for botched surgeries.

NBC 6 reports that the report also listed heart defect as a contributor to Meadows’s death which was listed as accidental. The procedure costs around $13,900, according to Dr Ricardo Rodriguez, a surgeon in Baltimore who runs the website cosmeticsurg, which explains in detail the procedure.

Surgeons at the clinic have previously been charged by the Florida Department of Health with medical malpractice and hiring unlicensed professionals. Similar charges have been filed against doctors at Vanity Cosmetic Surgery and Spectrum Aesthetics in Miami, affiliated clinics of Encore Plastic Surgery.

However, CBS notes that two surgeons listed in Encore’s website, Dr James McAdoo and Dr Orlando Llorento do not have history of complaints or have been disciplined by Florida.