A 53-year-old Greek-Canadian man is fighting for his life in the ICU at KAT Hospital in Athens after a planned dental implant procedure in Turkey ended in cardiac arrest, hypoxic brain injury, and a coma. His wife says doctors are not offering much hope.
Alexandros, a father of a young child who lives in Canada, traveled to Antalya with his wife, Maria Ziaka, on July 20. The couple had first researched clinics in Canada and Greece. Canadian prices, she said, were “unapproachable.” Turkey looked comparable on paper: similar materials, good reviews, even talk of state support and credentials.
They booked 12 implants — six in the upper jaw, six in the lower. The original plan was sedation plus local anesthesia.
According to his wife, he did not react well during the procedure, so the team switched to general anesthesia. The implants were placed, but he did not wake up.
She later saw him being taken, unconscious, to hospital. After about 48 hours she was told he was in a coma and that two blood clots had been found. He was treated at Anatolia Lara Hospital in Antalya with severe hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy after surgery and cardiac arrest. He has been intubated since.
“From a routine operation he is in this condition,” Maria told MEGA. “They don’t give us many hopes, but hope is inside us.” She also said she never got a clear answer about what went wrong, though the problem appeared tied to anesthesia and waking from it.
Getting him home became a diplomatic and logistical fight. Greece tried to send an EKAB air ambulance that flies under Hellenic Air Force responsibility. Turkey treated it as a military aircraft and refused landing. After Health Minister Adonis Georgiadis intervened, the transfer was reorganized on a civilian aircraft. Alexandros is now in critical condition in the KAT ICU.
POEDIN president Michalis Giannakos has used the case to warn that expensive dental work in Greece pushes patients toward clinics of uneven quality abroad. The story also sits in a longer line of reports about medical tourism gone wrong in Turkey — including other dental and cosmetic cases.
READ MORE: Mother’s quick CPR saves 12-year-old daughter after sudden brain haemorrhage.
