A woman has been fighting for her life after a careless gastric sleeve surgery abroad left her stomach feeling 'like concrete', the Liverpool ECHO reports. Pinky Jolley, 45 travelled to Istanbul for the procedure in November where she had 85% of her stomach removed after she ballooned to 17st 11lbs following serious medical complications which left her in a wheelchair.
UK doctors advised the diabetic woman to slim down when she piled on the pounds but after spending four years on NHS waiting lists for surgery, she launched a fundraiser to raise money for the procedure 'to allow her to have a future'. Pinky, who is unemployed, quickly raised over £2,000 and flew to Turkey two months later for the operation.
However, when she first arrived at the clinic she began to ponder her decision when she realised the staff 'could barely speak English' but said she felt she had to go ahead with the surgery. After a two-hour operation, she suffered from multiple complications, including intense abdominal pain, vomiting, and dehydration.
Just four days later, Pinky arrived back home to Wirral in December 2022 where her GP urged her to visit the hospital immediately. An emergency CT scan at Arrow Park Hospital showed a serious leak in her body after surgery which had led to an infection and essentially turned her internal organs 'to concrete'.
Pinky said: "I feel misled and upset that something that was meant to help has caused me so much suffering. I've lost four stone in four weeks because my stomach is tiny.
"I wanted to lose eight stone within two years. I've had to have a feeding tube to help but everything is so painful. After nearly dying I just wish I never got a gastric sleeve.
''They totally botched the operation and left my insides so infected they were all hard and like concrete the doctors said. It's been a horrible ordeal I just want to be well again. Looking back it was so cheap that I really should have thought twice but I just got so swept up.''
In order to save her life, three surgeons had to 'jet wash' the inside of her stomach on January 29 before she battled sepsis in the Royal Liverpool University Hospital for over a month. She should finally be able to return home on March 26 but Pinky has still not been able to eat solid food since November due to fear of further infection within the stomach and is instead relying on a feeding tube to assist her.
Pinky added: "I was excited that I might be finally doing something about my weight that I had waited four years to sort out. I had so much support from people after raising the money. I wanted to get started straight away."
The 45-year-old spent two days in a Turkish hospital recovering but it wasn't until she returned home that she started to experience intense abdominal pain, vomiting and extreme dehydration. She recalled: "It felt like someone was stabbing my stomach constantly.
"The only pain medication that was offered was paracetamol which barely helped with the pain. I demanded blood tests because I had never felt pain like this before."
Pinky who now weighs just 13st following the disastrous surgery and has fallen from a size 24 to a size 18 has been left with a gaping hole in her stomach. She said: "I'm lucky to be alive - my body was riddled with infection.
"I did nine months of research and wished they had performed a leak test. No one should have to go through this pain. I'm so thankful for all the help I've received when I returned. I
"'I've lost so much weight, but this isn't how I wanted it to happen."
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