What is ghost surgery?

The substitution of the surgeon a patient consented to with a different person, typically once the patient is under general anaesthesia. The substitute may be another doctor at the clinic, a junior, or in the worst documented cases someone not licensed to operate at all.

Is ghost surgery still happening in Korea?

The structural incentive (a famous name sells the consultation, cheaper hands do the work) has not disappeared, which is why the law now attacks it twice: the consent form must name the operating surgeon, and operating rooms that handle unconscious patients must have CCTV and record on request. Enforcement exists because the problem did.

Can I ask for my operation to be recorded?

Yes. For surgery under general anaesthesia or comparable sedation, hospitals and clinics in Korea are required to have operating-room CCTV, and recording happens when the patient or their guardian requests it. Ask before the operation, in writing, and keep the request with your papers.

How does Lowden & Co handle this?

The operating surgeon is named in your contract, and a substitution without your written consent is a contract breach with defined remedies rather than a complaint. What no facilitator can do is stand in the theatre; what we can do is make substitution provable and expensive. See /verification/.

Guides · Ghost surgery

The surgeon you met
may not be the one who operates.

Ghost surgery is the substitution of the surgeon a patient consented to with someone else once the patient is under anaesthesia, and in Korean cosmetic surgery it is a documented practice with case law and legislation behind it, not a rumor. Korea answered it structurally, twice: since 2016 the written consent form must name the operating surgeon and material changes require new consent (Medical Service Act, Article 24-2), and since September 2023 facilities operating on unconscious patients must have operating-room CCTV and must record when the patient asks. Both rights belong to you whether or not anyone mentions them.

How we verify surgeons Start anonymously

Why it happens

A famous name sells. Cheaper hands operate.

The economics are simple. A clinic's best-known surgeon fills the consultation calendar; the operating schedule that consultation feeds is worth more if other people can work through it in parallel. In the versions patients never notice, a colleague of similar seniority operates. In the versions that made Korean news, the substitute was a junior, a doctor from an unrelated specialty, or a non-doctor. The patient, under general anaesthesia, is the one person certain not to witness it.

This is why review counts and before-and-after galleries answer the wrong question. They tell you what a clinic has produced, not who produced it, and not who will be holding the instruments when it is your turn. The only version of that answer with any force is the one written into a document someone can be held to.

The two laws

What Korea did about it. Both rights are yours.

Named consent, 2016

Article 24-2 of the Medical Service Act requires written consent before surgery under general anaesthesia, and that consent must state who the operating surgeon is. If the surgeon changes, the change must be explained and consented to again. A consent form without a name on it is a form the law already says is incomplete.

Operating-room CCTV, 2023

Since September 2023, facilities performing surgery on patients under general anaesthesia or comparable sedation must have CCTV inside the operating room, and must record when the patient or guardian requests it. The recording is evidence that does not depend on anyone's memory or goodwill.

What the laws cannot do

Neither statute enforces itself. A patient who never asked for the recording, and whose consent form names no one, flies home with neither. The rights work when they are exercised before the anaesthesia, in writing, while you can still walk out.

Before you consent

Three lines to get in writing. Any clinic, any country.

First: the operating surgeon's name and licence number, in the contract and on the consent form. Second: a sentence stating that substitution without your written consent is a breach of that contract. Third: your written request for the operating-room recording, dated before the operation. A clinic that resists any of the three is telling you something useful while there is still time to hear it. Every surgeon this site connects is already committed to the first two in the contract itself, and the verification behind the name is described at /verification/.

FAQ

Asked plainly, answered plainly.

What is ghost surgery?: The substitution of the surgeon a patient consented to with a different person, typically once the patient is under general anaesthesia. The substitute may be another doctor at the clinic, a junior, or in the worst documented cases someone not licensed to operate at all.
Is ghost surgery still happening in Korea?: The structural incentive (a famous name sells the consultation, cheaper hands do the work) has not disappeared, which is why the law now attacks it twice: the consent form must name the operating surgeon, and operating rooms that handle unconscious patients must have CCTV and record on request. Enforcement exists because the problem did.
Can I ask for my operation to be recorded?: Yes. For surgery under general anaesthesia or comparable sedation, hospitals and clinics in Korea are required to have operating-room CCTV, and recording happens when the patient or their guardian requests it. Ask before the operation, in writing, and keep the request with your papers.
How does Lowden & Co handle this?: The operating surgeon is named in your contract, and a substitution without your written consent is a contract breach with defined remedies rather than a complaint. What no facilitator can do is stand in the theatre; what we can do is make substitution provable and expensive. See /verification/.