Anesthesiologist recognized for safe in-office surgical campaign

By Pat Michaels
Columnist

Corona Del Mar (AP) -- Anesthesiologist Barry Friedberg is well-known throughout the Newport-Mesa area for working with local cosmetic and plastic surgeons during surgeries in their offices. He is riding high today, however, knowing that his crusade to change plastic surgery in-office operating procedures is getting national attention.

Friedberg, who also teaches at USC, has long expressed alarm over the way some cosmetic procedures are performed. He feels there are serious risk factors in conducting in-office surgeries. The use of general anesthesia, he has cautioned, can give rise to “blood clots in your leg that can go to your lungs and maybe kill you.”

That warning, quoting Barry and hailing his efforts, has been repeated in numerous recent medical articles and at least three newly-published textbooks, including the prestigious Miller’s Anesthesia, considered the bible of anesthesiology.

Is there a safe way to conduct in-office surgical procedures? According to the articles, Dr. Friedberg has fathered newer techniques for intravenous sedation which make such surgeries safer. He also advocates the use of propofol ketamine, more commonly know as PK, along with carefully monitored anesthesia care when patients undergo the surgeries in a physician’s office. Friedberg’s own volume on the subject, “Anesthesia in Cosmetic Surgery,” is scheduled for publication by McGraw-Hill next spring.

What does Barry say about the recent avalanche of national recognition? Answer: “More evidence of my 13 years of ‘overnight’ success.”