With any kind of surgery, everyone knows there are risks, however if you are considering having Liposuction, here are some things you should consider.  

The most common complication of liposuction is a result that produces an unhappy patient.  Think about it, if your liposuction was successful and there were no complications involved, you would not be unhappy about it.  We're going to explore some of the things that can happen your cosmetic surgeon may not tell you about before you have liposuction:

Excessive Liposuction

The greatest and one of the most common mistakes many doctors make is trying to do too much surgery on the same day.  The three types of excessive surgery include: Removal of an excessive volume of fat by liposuction in a single day. Liposuction of an excessive number of body areas on the same day and combinations of liposuction and other related surgical procedures that involve excessive surgical trauma and prolonged exposure to general anesthesia.

Common and minor complications

There are common and minor complications that do not threaten a persons life or interfere with a persons bodily functions or ability to work. They may not interfere with your ability to work or function, however they can still be quite traumatizing for someone who has expected a totally different outcome.  These include superficial irregularities of the skin, seromas, hematomas, focal skin necrosis, allergic reaction to drugs, visible and disfiguring scars, discoloration of the skin, fainting during and after surgery, temporary bruising, and numbness or nerve injury.  Most of these complications can be considered quite minor, however some may become more serious.  Post-Liposuction syncope (fainting) the next morning at home, especially after urinating is not rare...this can be serious if the patient is alone, falls and sustains a head or neck injury.

Rare and Severe Complications

Complications due to anesthesia are indeed rare but it does happen.  Both local and systemic can be dangerous, which includes general anesthesia, and heavy intravenious IV sedation...if used by physicians who are not familiar with the pharmacology of tumescent local anesthesia or who are not adequately trained in the use of general anesthesia or intravenous sedation.  Blood clots in the legs are associated with prolonged and excessive surgical trauma.  Unfortunately many surgeons feel that doing "everything all at once" is the best way to do things.  As a patient, we are always concerned about our health, but let's face it, the temptation to get one "big" surgery is better than getting several small ones, and is also cheaper...so we think.  A blood clot in the leg can be fatal if it travels to the lung.  The occurance of blood clots is more common with general anesthesia than with local.  There is also a risk of injury to the internal organs due to penetration of the abdominal cavity by the liposuction cannula and this can be a life threatening injury if the injury is not promptly diagnosed and treated.  Under general anethesia, surgeons tend to use larger cannulas in an attempt to do liposuction with the greatest amount of speed, rather than the greatest possible finesse, and as a consequence intrabdominal injury is more common under general anesthesia.  Under local anesthesia, this type of injury would be so painful it would be noticed right away and treated.  Unfortunately, under general anethesia, this would not be the case...this type of injury would not be noticed right away until infection and bleeding had set in and progressed for many hours.  Another thing that is quite dangerous is to have gynecological procedures performed at the same time as liposuction, the increased risks of intrabdominal injury is much more likely.  Unfortunately space does not permit me to list all the dangers, however there are many other dangers that do exist:

Other Dangers

Excesive IV fluids - This can cause total body fluid overload.  Pulminary edema occurs when too much fluid collects.

Excessive Blood loss - Possible hematoma risks

Hypothermia - A dangerous fall in the body's temperature, can cause fatal cartiac problems

Infections - Rapid Growing Atypical Mycobacteria, from improperly sterilized liposuction instruments

Necrotizying fascitis - Is another potentially fatal infection and is associated with a penetrating wound to the intestines. 

Ask Questions

The best thing that you can do before you choose a doctor or facility is to ask questions and do your research.  Do not choose a doctor based on someone elses opinion or experience. The main thing is to do your rearch many times over.