Hair Loss News

Crown Cosmetic Surgery, a Los Angeles-based hair transplant clinic that touts low prices for hair transplant surgery, is being sued after a patient died during his hair transplant surgery.

The widow of 52-year-old Walter Riley, who died during surgery on April 27, 2006, is seeking unspecified damages in her suit that was filed Monday in Los Angeles Superior Court.

According to her attorney Ron Wilson, a medical expert who had been retained by his law firm determined that Riley had been given an overdose of anesthetic.

“It’s a several-hour procedure. They anesthetize you, they do the hair grafts and you come out looking great later. Or that’s what’s supposed to happen,” Wilson said Wednesday. “With Mr. Riley, he went in and within an hour he was dead.”

According to media reports a person who had returned a call from Crown Cosmetic said the company’s lawyer had advised that Crown not comment on the matter.

Mr. Riley is survived by his wife Yvonne Robison-Riley and her three adult children who are also plaintiffs in the suit.

It’s very unusual for a patient to die during a hair transplant procedure because typically a patient is given a local anesthetic and is awake during the entire procedure.   It’s unknown to us what type of anesthesia Mr. Riley was under when he died.