For many years, choosing a member of the Plastic Surgery Society was the best guarantee for a successful aesthetic procedure. Now the Ministry of Public Health is introducing additional controls, with a series of regulations for plastic surgery operations.
Minister Altagracia Guzman Marcelino says that in order to perform plastic, aesthetic and reconstructive operations, doctors should have two years of general surgery and three in other specialties.
In response to the increase in malpractice lawsuits linked to plastic surgery, Guzman issued a resolution that obliges practitioners in this field to be recognized by the State and to have carried out their medical residency in areas recognized by the Ministry.
Doctors who have carried out their specialties overseas will need to have the same training and experience with internationally accepted standards, and to present documentation that assesses their training apostilled and translated into Spanish.
The resolution also recognizes the rights of patients and their relatives to receive information about the surgeon as well as the medicines he or she is planning to use.
At present, the only plastic surgery residency in the Dominican Republic is at the Dominican Social Security Institute’s Salvador B. Gautier Hospital. Since its introduction in 1977, 37 doctors have completed the one-year residency.
The Dominican Society of Plastic, Reconstructive and Aesthetic Surgeons has been demanding the regulation of the profession for a long time, saying that many of the surgeons who come from countries like Mexico, Brazil and Peru have only taken three-month courses, which increases the risk of the patient dying on the operating table, as well as adversely affecting the reputation of plastic surgery in the Dominican Republic in general.
http://www.diariolibre.com/noticias/2015/03/24/i1068131_salud-pblica-regula-ejercicio-los-cirujanos-plsticos-repblica-dominicana.html