A Miami Lakes butt lift ended with lacerated liver and fat in lungs, state says
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The day after a Brazilian butt lift in Miami Lakes, a woman lay dead with a sliced liver, blood in torso cavities near organs, fat in her lungs and a blood vessel that goes into the lungs, a state complaint says.
The administrative complaint was filed by the Florida Department of Health against Dr. Enrique Hanabergh, who performed the surgery in his Miami Lakes office. The complaint starts the process that can end with Hanabergh cleared, fined, or suspended by the Board of Medicine.
Hanabergh’s license, which he has held since 2009, contains no previous disciplinary issues. He has been board certified by the American Board of Plastic Surgery since November 2013.
“I am challenging the allegations and deny any wrongdoing,” Hanabergh said in an email to the Miami Herald. “I am awaiting a hearing with the board.”
Hanabergh’s email also said he does two to four surgeries a day, depending on the time and type of each surgery. He does surgeries three days a week.
MORE: Nose job, breast job, liposuction, death: State complaint against a Miami doctor
A Brazilian butt lift in Miami Lakes ends at Jackson
According to the complaint, 36-year-old Patient G.D. went to Hanabergh’s office, 7975 NW 154th St., suite 400, on Aug. 16, 2023, for a Brazilian butt lift, also known as a BBL. In this form of liposuction, the doctor uses a cannula to suck fat from the abdomen area, then injects it into the buttocks.
The complaint said Hanabergh’s operative note said neither what technique was used for fat injection nor did it state what kind of ultrasound guidance was used. Florida requires ultrasound guidance on BBLs.
Also, the operative note didn’t say when Hanabergh wrote or dictated it.
The complaint said, after recovery, Patient G.D. “was discharged in stable condition.” Office surgery patients must be discharged within 24 hours, so BBL patients usually go to a recovery house after surgery.
“Later the same day, Patient G.D. experienced shortness of breath and lost consciousness,” the complaint said. “EMS was called, and she was taken to Jackson Memorial Hospital, where her condition continued to deteriorate.”
The complaint said Jackson doctors planned emergency surgery to examine problems in G.D.’s abdomen and chest areas, but she died about a half hour into the surgery.
Postmortem examination, the complaint said, showed she had suffered “a liver laceration ... a fat globule in the middle-sized pulmonary vessel ... and microscopic evidence of widespread fat emboli in the lungs.”
There was also a hematoma behind abdominal living, bleeding in the space with the abdominal and pelvic organs, and blood in the space between lungs and the rib cage.
The standard of care, the complaint said, required Hanabergh “not pass the cannula through the muscle and fascia of the patient’s abdomen into the abdominal cavity causing intra-abdominal injury to internal organs during the liposuction procedure.”
This story was originally published August 7, 2025 at 11:36 AM.
