A grieving father has urged Britons to avoid surgery abroad after his daughter died from complications following a weight-loss operation in Turkey. Ricardo Ribeiro spoke out days after an inquest concluded that Morgan Ribeiro, 20, died as a result of complications from the procedure.
Morgan, a nursery worker from Croydon, South London, had struggled with her weight from a young age and had counted the days until her gastric sleeve surgery in Turkey. She hoped it would change her life, but instead it ended it.
Emergency landing and death
Just three days after undergoing surgery in January 2024, Morgan collapsed on a flight back to the UK, forcing the plane to make an emergency landing in Belgrade, Serbia. She died in a hospital there five days later.
Last week, an inquest concluded that Morgan perished as a result of complications from the operation. A post-mortem examination found that her intestinal wall had ruptured during the procedure, which triggered deadly peritonitis.
Father's warning
Speaking to people considering surgery overseas, Ricardo said: “You’re putting your life in the hands of someone you can’t guarantee will do the job correctly.”
“Yes, 80% may come out with a perfect result, and everyone says ‘it’s my body, my choice,’ but you’ve still got family who’ve got to deal with the agony if you pass away – you have to realise the effect is wider than that.”
“Part of me died that day – it’s a gut punch I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy. I don’t want any other family to suffer what I’ve suffered.”
Surgeon replaced
Ricardo, 46, told how Morgan spent hours choosing a reputable-looking surgeon with glowing reviews. But when she arrived in Istanbul on January 5, 2024, the hospital replaced her chosen doctor with someone else. He fears the new medic may have lacked experience and proper checks were not conducted.
Ricardo said: “If they have to replace a surgeon with somebody else, they should ensure they’re capable of doing the job. It feels like many doctors there [in Turkey] are not held to the same high standards as British surgeons. It doesn’t make sense.”
Morgan was scheduled to stay in hospital for two nights, but she was kept in for an extra day because of swelling, stomach pains and a fever. Yet in discharge notes obtained by the coroner, hospital staff claim Morgan was recovering and signed her off as medically fit to fly.
Ricardo said: “You cannot have kept her in for an extra day due to concerns, and on the discharge sheet have no concerns written whatsoever – it’s rubbish. It was blatantly just a form that you reuse and change the pieces to suit your needs. All they’ve done is cover themselves. To me, it just doesn’t ring true.”
Surgeon denies wrongdoing
In 2024, the Mirror tracked down Morgan’s surgeon, who was named by the coroner as Dr Serkan Bayil, and he denied any wrongdoing, claiming that Morgan died of an embolism. But the coroner couldn’t get hold of him, and the hospital in Istanbul, Medivita Incirli Hastanesi, is listed online as permanently closed.
Ricardo says Global Medical Care – the firm that organised the trip and introduced Morgan to the hospital – also has questions to answer. He said: “They put the [team] together, so some of that responsibility has to lie with them. If you’re going to provide a service to someone, you make sure that their best interests are at the forefront.”
Ricardo thinks Global Medical Care and other similar companies should be barred from plugging surgery through social media ads. He added: “These companies are targeting the British public with fairytales – no matter what social media you go on, you’re bombarded with everything from gastric bands to Turkey teeth. The UK government should be banning [the ads]. If people were more aware they probably wouldn’t go, because who is going to risk their life for a BBL, breast implant or a gastric sleeve? It feels like money is more motivational to these companies than human life.”
For Ricardo, most agonising of all is just how much his daughter had to live for. “Morgan did have a stage where she was crying out for help,” her dad said. “She was dealing with bullying due to her weight, and she wasn’t in the best of places. But at the time of her death, she was blossoming. She knew she wanted to work with young people, because she understood what it was like to get bullied. She’d overcome all those problems, and wanted to help others do the same. She went from trying to do so much good to having her life end in the blink of an eye.”
He has vowed never to give up on his fight for justice. He said: “Someone, somewhere, has got to take accountability for what happened. Because if that doesn’t happen, how many more people are going to be burying their children?”
Global Medical Care Turkey said: “We were saddened by Morgan’s death. We understand why her father is asking these questions. When a patient approaches us, we present more than one doctor and hospital option. The patient makes their own choice. Before a patient travels, a live consultation is arranged directly between the patient and the treating doctor, in which the risks are explained and set out in writing. The decision to proceed remains the patient’s. The clinical assessment, consent process, the surgery and post-operative care are carried out by the hospital.”
A UK government spokesperson said: “We would urge anyone considering medical procedures abroad to review guidance from the NHS and other bodies.”
