Where are Elchin Mamedov, Vladimir Tapia Fernandez and Gevorg Stepanyan now?

Where are Elchin Mamedov, Vladimir Tapia Fernandez and Gevorg Stepanyan now?

January 26, 2022

Poor-quality operations, patient deaths, being put on the international wanted list... This is exactly the “recognition” achieved by some plastic surgeons, who were previously considered masters in their field. Some of them turned out to be a fraudster, others made an unforgivable mistake, and still others found themselves in the midst of a powerful scandal, not even related to their profession. Which of the specialists who previously had queues of clients no longer have an impeccable reputation and where are they now?

Elchin Mamedov

His name has become a household name for scammers and would-be surgeons who do not know how to perform plastic surgery. In the mid-2000s, Elchin Mamedov was the most popular doctor among Russian celebrities who wanted to improve their appearance. Celebrity friends, top-rated TV shows, an endless stream of wealthy clients... All this ended after the publicity of the case of Anna Spitsyna, a patient who fell into a coma after an operation by a famous surgeon. Then accusations against Mamedov rained down like from a cornucopia. Disfigured women talked about how their appearance, health and life deteriorated after a poor-quality operation by a well-publicized doctor.

For 12 years now, Anna Spitsyna has been in a vegetative state without changes, while the life of Elchin Mamedov has managed to perform various somersaults. Thus, the doctor continued to live in Russia while he was in the status of a witness in a criminal case. But when it became known that the doctor had a diploma in pediatrics and had never specialized in maxillofacial and plastic surgery, but studied from videotapes, Mamedov immediately hid in his homeland - Azerbaijan. But if at first the notorious surgeon went into hiding, now he is again performing operations, attending social events and talking about the benefits of plastic surgery while in Baku. Despite the fact that he was put on the international wanted list, Azerbaijan refused to extradite its citizen to Russian investigators.

Elchin Mamedov now

Vladimir Tapia Fernandez

Currently, Vladimir Tapia Fernandez works at the Medion clinic in Tashkent.

The plastic surgeon, who also gained popularity in the 2000s, suddenly found himself at the center of a serious scandal. A doctor working at the Lancet clinic at the First Clinical Hospital of the Administrative Department of the President of the Russian Federation was accused by his wife of pedophilia in 2011. The wife wrote a statement to the Investigative Committee, accusing the surgeon of molesting her own children. For the Russian public, this was a shocking incident, because a widely respected specialist was accused of one of the most serious crimes. However, the Moscow social circle was critical of this news, given the character and reputation of the doctor, as well as the fact that the wife made a public confession amid preparations for divorce.

Vladimir Tapia denied the charges, and in December 2013 the jury unanimously found the defendant not guilty, after which the Moscow City Court acquitted him. The prosecutor's office challenged it, but the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation upheld it. At the same time, in September 2020, lawyer Genrikh Padva reported that the Moscow City Court recognized as legal the continuation of the investigation against a plastic surgeon, whom the jury had previously found not guilty of pedophilia. The lawyer, in a commentary to RIA Novosti, explained that, despite the acquittal that came into force, the investigator continues the investigation. “We don’t understand the meaning of the investigation - Tapia is acquitted, but there is a case, they can’t help but have a stake on their head,” the lawyer said. According to media reports, in connection with this, lawyers filed a complaint against the investigator’s actions, first to the district court, and then to the Moscow City Court. “But the Moscow City Court refused to satisfy our complaint,” Padva added.

Long legal battles and proceedings with his ex-wife forced Vladimir Tapia to go home to Uzbekistan. Currently, the plastic surgeon works in his specialty at the Medion clinic in Tashkent. At the same time, the specialist is listed in the register of full members of the Society of Plastic, Reconstructive and Aesthetic Surgeons of Russia.

Gevorg Stepanyan

This doctor joined the list of doctors who left Russia after the trial. More precisely, in the midst of it. Initially, the specialist wanted to develop and expand the list of his clients, for which he moved to Moscow from Yerevan in 2022. At first, the practice was successful, patients left positive reviews of the surgeon’s work. Dr. Stepanyan was invited as an expert to film programs on federal television channels.

Perhaps the specialist’s career could have developed further, but at the end of 2022, Gevorg Stepanyan made a medical mistake. According to the case file, in November of that year he performed rhinoplasty on Muscovite Caroline Sargsyan, but during the operation the patient suffered a fracture of the skull bones and Quincke's edema. The girl had to be put into a coma so that she could recover. To punish the surgeon for the grave consequences for her health, Carolina turned to the Investigative Committee. As the girl herself said on the air of the “Let Them Talk” program, for publicizing the situation, Stepanyan’s brother threatened her and promised to “break her legs.”

The doctor himself denied everything and shifted the blame to the head physician and anesthesiologist of the clinic. Gevorg Stepanyan claimed that rhinoplasty was successful. The next day, he cleaned her wounds of blood, after which he flew to Armenia for a couple of days. When he returned, he was shocked by what had happened. The surgeon gave an interview to the media that the deterioration of the patient’s condition was provoked by medications that the anesthesiologist Lev Khitrin prescribed to the girl. Allegedly, the anesthesiologist wanted to place a catheter in the patient’s neck, but he was unable to do so and because of this, the carotid artery was damaged. Then, Stepanyan assures, the head physician Gulnara Shah entered the nose with a suction and began to clean out the blood in this way, but Caroline began to bleed profusely.

Soon the plastic surgeon was sent to a pre-trial detention center to await trial, but the doctor’s friends and acquaintances filed a petition to change his preventive measure. Moreover, the Armenian Embassy in Moscow also vouched for the doctor. But, as soon as Gevorg Stepanyan was released from the pre-trial detention center, he immediately left Russia. Currently, Gevorg Stepanyan is in the USA.

Plastic surgeon Gevorg Stepanyan is now in the USA

Gulnara Shah

This famous specialist, the head of the Sfera clinic, found herself at the center of a scandal in 2022 because of the aforementioned Gevorg Stepanyan, who was her employee. Then the Moscow Main Investigative Directorate of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation opened a criminal case under Art. 238 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (performing work or providing services that do not meet safety requirements), after a patient operated on at Sphere fell into a coma. In addition, Roszdravnadzor inspectors found other violations - the clinic did not have a medical license to provide plastic surgery services, there was no necessary medical equipment, and the medical staff could not provide round-the-clock monitoring of patients.

After this situation, Gulnara Shah continued to see patients at the Moscow NACFF clinic

First, Gulnara Shah was arrested and then transferred to house arrest. She had to close the clinic, after which she paid a fine as part of a criminal case.

Following the conclusion of her legal proceedings, Dr Shah returned to practice. At the moment, Gulnara Shah is also on the list of full members of the OPREH of Russia. Her last known place of work was the NACFF clinic.

Guram Papiashvili

The only specialist on our “disgraced” list from St. Petersburg performed a facelift, after which the patient died from septic shock with the addition of disseminated intravascular coagulation syndrome due to blood loss. 62-year-old Sofia Snigireva, as the media wrote, was familiar with her plastic surgeon and completely trusted him. However, it was precisely because of his unprofessional actions, according to investigators, that she died.

Reconstructing the chronology of events, investigators found that on May 29, Guram Papiashvili underwent a facelift and blepharoplasty. Moreover, the operation itself was carried out despite the ban on the provision of routine medical care imposed by the city’s chief sanitary doctor Natalia Bashketova due to the coronavirus. As the Vademecum portal reported, the patient spent the night in the clinic and went home on the morning of May 30. There, Sofia Snigireva’s health became worse, and in the evening, after a call from her relatives, Guram Papiashvili came to the patient: at first he tried to help the woman on the spot, but in the end he decided to take her back to the clinic, where “resuscitation measures” continued. Snigireva's sons insisted on hospitalizing their mother at the National Medical Research Center named after. V.A. Almazov, but routing the patient to a serious clinic was fatally late - on June 1, the woman died.

The clinic where the patient died

Dr. Papiashvili worked in medicine for more than 27 years and there were no serious complaints about his professionalism. However, the accusations in the death of the patient are not the only one. During the investigation, it turned out that the clinic owned by Papiashvili did not have the right to provide plastic surgery services, although it actively advertised them. Until 2018, the medical center had a license to perform plastic surgery on an outpatient basis, but after the tightening of the Procedure for providing specialized care (Order of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation No. 298n), the document was reissued and aesthetic plastic surgery services were not included in it.

On June 5, 2022, the Vasileostrovsky District Court of St. Petersburg sent Guram Papiashvili to house arrest for three months, until August. It is currently unknown whether a verdict was passed against the surgeon.

Tapia Fernandez Rene Pablo

General surgeon, plastic and maxillofacial surgeon, oncologist surgeon. Has the highest medical category and membership in ROPREH. He has been practicing as a plastic surgeon since 1996.

Plastic surgeon Tapia Fernandez Rene Pablo graduated from the Universidad San Francisco Javier in Argentina in 1985. Then he studied in residency in the specialty “Clinical Surgery”, and underwent advanced training in the same area. After 10 years, the doctor moves to Russia and masters the specialty of a plastic surgeon. From that moment on, he completely devoted himself to aesthetic medicine: he studied various techniques for operating the face and body at the Central Research Institute of Dentistry and Facial Surgery and the Peoples' Friendship University of Russia, took intensive courses, as well as various training programs on working with modern cosmetic preparations.

The last place of work of Tapia Fernandez Rene Pablo is the Lancet Center for Plastic and Endoscopic Surgery. Here the doctor receives and consults patients, and also performs a wide range of aesthetic surgeries on the face, body and limbs. In addition to plastic surgery, Tapia Fernandez knows non-invasive cosmetological techniques, which are also included in the list of specialist services.

Clinic:

• TAPIA Plastic Surgery and Cosmetology Clinic
• Lancet Plastic Surgery Clinic
• First surgery Multidisciplinary clinic

Prices for services: