Tumescent liposuction, a technique used in cosmetic surgery clinics to suck out excess fat from the body, can be fatal, a leading medical journal warns today.
Liposuction is the most common cosmetic operation in the United States and is rapidly gaining in popularity here as an apparently easy and instant means to get rid of surplus bulges.
The tumescent technique, which involves injecting under the skin a solution containing anaesthetic drugs, which is then sucked out with the fat, has become the preferred operation in the past 10 years because of its supposed greater safety than earlier methods requiring general anaesthetic.
But in the New England Journal of Medicine, published today, an article describes five deaths of those who had tumescent liposuction, and warns that the procedure 'is not trivial, because it has the potential to kill otherwise healthy persons.'
Rama Rao of the New York city poison control centre, and colleagues, suspect that high doses of the anaesthetic drug lidocaine may be responsible, and urge that the technique be fully investigated.
'Deaths due to cosmetic surgery should be a matter for serious public concern,' the team said.
In three of the five cases looked at by the researchers, the patients died when their blood pressure and heart rate dropped to a critically low level. One died of fluid overload, and the fifth died of blood clots in the calf veins during fat removal from the legs which moved up to block the main lung arteries.
By Sarah Boseley and Sally James
Industry praised for cleaner air
The air is becoming cleaner with emissions of key pollutants more than halving in the past 10 years, a report revealed yesterday. The environment agency study found improvement programmes have contributed to reductions and praised the 'significant efforts' of industry.
Lead emissions have been reduced by 60%, from 475 tonnes in 1990 to 194 tonnes, while particulates are down by 50%, from 123,000 tonnes to 64,000 tonnes. And PM10s (small particulates less than 10 microns in diameter) have been reduced by more than 60%, to 34,000 tonnes. There has also been a decrease of over 50% in sulphur dioxide and benzene has been reduced by more than 60%.
The figures were released to launch the agency's new pollution inventory website www.environment-agency.gov.uk. which contains information on more than 150 pollutants from some 2,000 of the largest industrial processes in England and Wales.
By just typing in a postcode or clicking on a map, anyone can find out about the industrial emissions in their local area.
Sectarian attack on workman
A 39-year-old Catholic workman was last night in hospital after he was shot in the chest in a sectarian murder attempt.
He was shot twice as he arrived at a building site at Castlemara in Carrickfergus, north of Belfast. He was last night said to be 'comfortable'.
The Ulster Freedom Fighters denied involvement, and suggested that loyalist dissidents were responsible. The Ulster Volunteer Force also said it had nothing to do with the attack.
The victim, from Magherafelt, Co Londonderry, who was employed as a sub-contractor for the housing executive, had worked in the area for nine months.
Alliance party leader Sean Neeson, who represents the area, said: 'The whole community in Carrickfergus will condemn this and I would encourage people to assist the police to bring the culprit to justice. I am very concerned at the level of paramilitary activity in the area and so are most of the community.'
The Castlemara estate has been dogged by paramilitary activity and allegations of drug dealing.
By John Mullin
Dinosaurs moved at a turkey trot
Tracks made 200 million years ago in Greenland have led biologists to new flights of the imagination. Theropod dinosaurs such as tyrannosaurus rex did the turkey trot - they were practically pigeon-toed.
Stephen Gatesy of Brown university and other US colleagues report in Nature today that they have startling evidence preserved in what was once slushy soil in Greenland in the late triassic era.
They measured the tracks of theropod dinosaurs the hunter-killer class that stalked on two legs both in soft and firm muds. By comparing the same tracks over different grades of going, and then chasing turkeys and guineafowl across swampy ground, they built up a clearer picture of past fancy footwork.
Although there were similarities with modern birds, the scientists could see the differences. On firm ground, the theropod's foot produced shallow, three-toed impressions. On muds, the foot sank deeper and left behind unusually long four-toed prints.
The effect was much as if a turkey had stepped into a puddle of farmyard slurry. The foot plunged down, and forward, then the toes collapsed together below the surface as the entire foot emerged at the front of the track.
'The possibility that a dinosaur's toes could enter and exit the sediment in different places had not even been considered until we saw the turkey do it,' said Dr Gatesy.
By Tim Radford
