A French man has tragically taken his own life after a beard transplant he received in Turkey was mishandled by an estate agent masquerading as a surgeon.
According to Mail Online, Mathieu Vigier Latour traveled to Istanbul in March for the procedure, which cost him €1,300. However, the treatment resulted in the loss of 1,000 hair grafts, despite 4,000 being transferred from his head to his face.
Following the operation, the business student ended up with an irregularly shaped beard that grew at an unnatural angle, described by his heartbroken father as looking “hedgehog-like.”
Additionally, at just 24 years old, Latour suffered burns from the procedure and experienced difficulty sleeping due to the discomfort.
He later discovered that the individual who performed the transplant was not a qualified surgeon, but rather an estate agent, as reported by the Telegraph.
As a consequence of this botched operation, Latour fell into a “vicious cycle” and developed dysmorphic disorder, a condition characterized by an obsession with perceived flaws in one’s appearance.
A Belgian specialist who attempted to rectify the damage indicated that Latour’s scalp would never heal in the areas where the grafts had been lost.
Three months after his trip to Turkey for the transplant, Latour took his own life. His father is now advocating for greater awareness of the risks associated with seemingly affordable health tourism.
He expressed that it would be “a tribute to Mathieu” if his son’s tragic experience could help prevent similar incidents from occurring in the future.
