A woman who was exposed earlier this year for offering to inject clients with a substance that would enhance their buttocks on a popular US television programme appears to be making her way into the Jamaican market by advertising her services via BlackBerry Messenger.

The show, which is aired in the United States, highlights businesses or persons with false claims and scams.

Recently, THE STAR received a BlackBerry broadcast message, which said, "If u need a butt implant, link me ASAP, serious clients only."

Investigations by our news team revealed that the broadcast message was sent by a woman claiming to be the cousin of the woman who was caught on the TV programme.

The woman, who uses an alias on BlackBerry Messenger, told THE STAR that she is the contact person for her cousin who is a certified nurse from New York City.

Using an alias, THE STAR made contact with the cousin and she told the news team about the procedure, and how long she has been doing it.

"I'm very skilled at performing the butt augmentation procedure. I've been doing this for over four years now. I did my training in the Dominican Republic, it's very popular over there," she said in a heavy American accent.

When asked if a member of the news team could meet with her for a consultation, she said, "I don't have an office, I don't live out here. I only come to Jamaica like three or four times a year, so I will come to you. It can be done anywhere at your convenience."

She went on to state that the procedure costs US$900 (J$91,674) if the potential client resides in Kingston, and US$1,000 (J$101,860) if they reside out of town.

safe and very natural

When THE STAR raised concerns, she was quick to add "It's very natural for you to be concerned because this is something foreign that's going in your body. But what I use is Hydrogel, it's a filler. It's very safe and very natural, it's done by shots (injections), I use 240cc of Hydrogel per butt cheek."

She continued, "Yuh can ask about me, everybody that I've done, dem man hate me because their women use it to find next man."

She went on to chastise those persons who were naïve enough to have had their procedure done by unscrupulous persons.

"There are some people who use products such as cement and fix-a-flat and other household items in people, but they all have a smell. So how could people sit there and let someone inject them with something that has a strong odour and c'mon, cement has a colour, so people must realise that something is off!"

She was quick to add, however, that unlike the products she mentioned earlier "The Hydrogel is clear and doesn't have a smell like the other products, it's very safe."

Meanwhile, Consultant Plastic Surgeon Dr Rajeev Venugopal told our news team that the product Hydrogel that the woman speaks so highly of is actually used for other purposes.

"To my knowledge, Hydrogel is basically something that can be used to dress chronic wounds, in our literature, Hydrogel is not recommended to be used for the purpose of volume enhancement or butt augmentation."

He continued, "It is not FDA (Food and Drug Administration) approved, there are two common procedures that are approved in our literature and those are the use of fat, harvested from the patient's body or implants."

Dr Venugopal, who has been practising plastic surgery for some 11 years, also told THE STAR that even if hydrogel was approved by the FDA to perform the 'Brazilian Butt Lift' for the amount of product that would be required, the cost would be extravagant.

Making reference to a product that he uses to fill wrinkles in patients, he told THE STAR, "I use hyaluronic acid, which is used to fill wrinkles and a box which contains two cc costs US$600 (J$61,116), excluding the cost of shipping, there's no way she can be using that compound at that price unless she's making it herself."

Dr Venugopal warns persons to be wary of these back door procedures.

"Persons who let these persons do these procedures are putting themselves at risk for infection, bleeding and an allergic reaction to the product that is being injected."