Ayoub Sayeg

Introduction

Dr. Ayoub Sayeg is a southeast Michigan plastic surgeon whose medical licenses have been suspended across four states in 2026, a cascade that began with an Illinois order in July, spread through Virginia and Michigan in August and September, and reached California days after a Detroit television investigation aired his patients’ accounts. Sayeg, who lives in Franklin, Michigan, and whose practice locations included West Bloomfield, Dearborn, and Southfield, built his website identity around being “a well-respected plastic surgeon since 2002.” The Michigan suspension — the central action against him — rests on state allegations that his care of two patients showed he posed an “immediate threat to the public health, safety, or welfare.” He is contesting the action, with a hearing on the suspension scheduled for late November.

Background Information

Sayeg’s regulatory unraveling began outside Michigan. His Illinois medical license was temporarily suspended on July 7, 2026, with the suspension order citing his “inadequate collaboration with Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetists, constituting an immediate danger to the public” — a finding about how he ran anesthesia coverage during procedures. Virginia suspended his license on August 5, 2026, citing the Illinois proceedings. Michigan, the state where he actually practiced, followed on September 28, 2026, suspending his license on the basis of its administrative complaint, which alleged his care posed an “immediate threat to the public health, safety, or welfare.” The Investigators on Local 4, WDIV’s investigative unit, had been examining Sayeg’s practice for months before the suspensions, and their reporting became part of the case’s public record.

The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation

Administrative suspension, contested findings. The state actions against Sayeg are license suspensions based on administrative complaints — not criminal charges, and not final adjudications. Sayeg, through his attorney, has disputed specific patient accounts, and a Michigan hearing on the suspension is pending. He is entitled to the contested process now underway.

The Michigan complaint centers on the care of two patients identified in state papers by their initials, J.R. and D.B. The complaint alleges Sayeg created two different operative reports for J.R.’s April 2024 face and neck lift — one of which did not mention fat grafting and injections — and points to inconsistencies between the documents. It further alleges Sayeg documented eye-related procedures without records showing informed consent or that the procedures had ever been planned. Those are record-keeping and consent violations of the kind state boards treat as serious because they obscure what was actually done to a patient.

D.B., a former patient, told Local 4 she “felt deformed” after Sayeg performed breast implant surgery on her in 2024. She said she and Sayeg agreed on a specific implant size, but the state complaint says he implanted a size 100 cubic centimeters larger. D.B. said she went through “6 months of pain,” paid for a second corrective surgery with Sayeg herself, and said the results were worse: “I had two different sized breasts. I couldn’t wear a bathing suit anymore,” she told the station. “He was almost making me feel… defeated.” She also told Local 4 her complaint took nearly two years to produce action: “I think he’s a terrible doctor — I complained almost two years ago and we’re just now beginning to do something about this.”

Public Reaction and Consequences

The California suspension gave the case its public tipping point. On October 14, 2026 — days after Local 4 broadcast its investigation — California regulators suspended Sayeg’s license there “based on suspension or revocation in another state,” the reciprocal mechanism states use when a physician has been deemed dangerous elsewhere. That brought the count to four states and effectively foreclosed Sayeg from relocating his practice across state lines while the Michigan case proceeds. Local 4 also spoke with a former patient identified as Jolene, who said a breast reduction Sayeg performed in the mid-2000s left her in pain and with what she described as his initials carved into her body; she later sued and received a settlement. Sayeg’s attorney disputed her account in a letter, asking: “How is it possible for anyone to believe that decades ago a brand was carved into a patient’s body by a physician in a hospital populated with other doctor witnesses, nurse witnesses and other hospital personnel without a single medical record, a single document being generated.” The attorney had not responded to the station’s requests for comment on the state’s complaint.

The case has also become an example of patients’ frustration with the pace of medical oversight. D.B.’s “two years” complaint — echoed in the fact that formal action followed her initial grievance by roughly 24 months — captured the gap between when regulators first hear about a physician and when they act. For the Detroit-area medical community, the four-state suspension of a surgeon who operated multiple office locations raised the practical question of what recourse patients have when the regulatory system moves slower than the harm they allege.

Current Status

Sayeg’s Michigan summary suspension is the live proceeding: a hearing on whether to lift it is scheduled for November 24, 2026, after his lawyers told a judge on October 20 that they hope to resolve the case before a state board meeting the following month. Until that hearing, his licenses in Michigan, Illinois, Virginia, and California all remain suspended. No criminal charges have been reported in the case; the actions to date are administrative. The findings in the state complaints are contested allegations, and Sayeg is entitled to — and is pursuing — the administrative process.

Impact on Their Career/Life

A plastic surgeon suspended in four states simultaneously has, for practical purposes, no ability to operate: the sanctions follow him across every jurisdiction where he held licenses, and the “immediate threat” findings make interim practice in a fifth state untenable. Sayeg’s two-decade practice — built on elective surgery, where reputation is the product — now carries a public record of state findings he contests, televised patient accounts, and a prior lawsuit and settlement. The November 24 hearing will determine whether the Michigan suspension is lifted, narrowed, or converted into longer-term discipline; whatever the outcome, the cascade of 2026 has already dismantled the practice his website described as “well-respected” since 2002.

Sources

• WDIV Local 4 (ClickOnDetroit), “Michigan plastic surgeon’s license suspended in 4th state days after Local 4 investigation,” October 20, 2026 — source