Reviews of Dr. Barak Tanzman, D.O. (Plastic Surgery)

Laura McCandliss

Unprofessional, and possibly very negligent. Used scare tactics to pressure me into a surgery, and I could have died on his watch. What happened was, about a year ago, I was taken to Huron Valley DMC Mt. Sinai Hospital by ambulance because I had a post-op infection and early sepsis. I contracted the staph from an operation to get a post reconstructive ruptured breast implant (I originally only had breast cancer in one breast, so only one implant) removed at a different hospital the week before. That hospital was beyond the mileage limits of the ambulance from my house. I had a high heart rate, high fever, and severe chills. My chest wall had swollen up to the size of a watermelon. Dr. Tanzman first criticized harshly the surgeon who took out the implant (who had about 20 more years experience than Dr. Tanzman), implying that if I had a replacement implant put in, then I wouldn't have had the staph infection/sepsis/cellulitis. He said "it's just Plastic surgery 101, you are just asking for an infection if you don't provide a replacement for something that you took out. I don't know who this last guy is who operated on you, but he didn't do his job right, and now you have an infection." Then he pressured me into giving my consent for him to perform an emergency "cleanout surgery" without getting my accelerated heart rate down to a stable level. He said "That other hospital doesn't have a bed, it could take a week to get one, and you need this cleanout surgery now, so what are you going to do?" and he handed me the form to sign. He also said at one point "breast reconstruction is us plastic surgeon's bread and butter." It made me really re-think the whole industry of plastic surgery. I had no idea that the fact that I was a breast cancer survivor only meant a paycheck to a doctor. When I asked Dr. Tanzman what he suggested I do after he does the cleanout surgery if I consented, he said "I don't know, you're not my patient." I was scared because I figured I was in a dangerous position and didn't know what to do, so I signed the form. Moments later, In what I call a divine intervention, a nurse popped her head in just as the docs were about to go scrub in and told me that the other hospital was sending a transfer ambulance to get me to the hospital that did the explant. When I arrived there, that hospital flooded me with almost a gallon of IV fluids to get my heart rate down before they would put me on the table. This is scary stuff how some surgeons are that greedy to get another patient on the table and will do scare tactics at all costs to pressure the patient, even if it meant inflicting danger and possibly death on an already septic patient. I guess that's all part of bread and butter. I think that if I didn't get transferred to that other hospital with the original surgeon who removed the implant, Dr. Tanzman would have operated on me with a high heart rate and I would have crashed on his table. Scary stuff. I'm just thankful of God's timing, and I think other people should be made aware of my story.