How to verify a surgeon in Colombia: the four free lookups, step by step

Before you compare prices, confirm two things: that the person operating on you is a licensed health professional in Colombia, and that the building where it happens is authorized to do that surgery. Both checks run on free government databases. They are in Spanish, they have a captcha, and one of them needs a number most patients don’t know to ask for — which is why so few people run them.

This guide walks through each lookup as it appears on the live government pages, explains what a result proves and what it doesn’t, and ends with a red-flags checklist and a short Spanish glossary. It takes about fifteen minutes per surgeon. Journalists, clinics and patient groups are welcome to cite it with a link.

01Why do these checks matter?

Because the problem in Colombia is not the country’s best hospitals — it is the unlicensed end of a large market. In two years the Antioquia health authority inspected 80 aesthetic centers and closed 64 of them, and 17 people died in Medellín after procedures at irregular centers between 2024 and May 2026¹¹. The US State Department’s Level 3 advisory for Colombia says plainly that US citizens “have suffered serious complications and even died from cosmetic or other elective surgeries,” and tells travelers to research both the doctor and the recovery facility¹³.

The four lookups below won’t tell you whether a surgeon is skilled. They tell you whether the surgeon is who the clinic says, holds the qualification the clinic claims, and operates in a place the health authorities have authorized. That removes most of the risk that shows up in the news.

02ReTHUS: is the doctor licensed?

ReTHUS — the Registro Único Nacional del Talento Humano en Salud — is the Ministry of Health’s register of everyone authorized to practice a health profession in Colombia, created under Ley 1164 de 2007¹. The Ministry says its purpose is to let citizens confirm that a health worker “ha cumplido con los requisitos para su ejercicio” — has met the requirements to practice — and to see ethics-tribunal sanctions for medicine, dentistry and nursing.

The public lookup lives at this exact address²:

web.sispro.gov.co/THS/Cliente/ConsultasPublicas/ConsultaPublicaDeTHxIdentificacion.aspx

Make sure you are on the sispro.gov.co government domain. Here is what you see and what to enter:

1. Step 1Tipo de Identificación (required). Choose the ID type from the dropdown: Cédula de Ciudadanía (Colombian citizens), Cédula de Extranjería (foreign residents), Permiso por protección temporal, or Tarjeta de Identidad.
2. Step 2Número de Identificación (required). Type the ID number with no dots or spaces. This is the field most patients get stuck on — see the next section.
3. Step 3Primer Nombre, Primer Apellido (optional). The first name and first surname. Colombians usually carry two surnames; the first one is the father’s. You can leave these blank.
4. Step 4Captcha (required). Type the four digits shown in the image.
5. Step 5“Verificar Registro en ReTHUS.” Press the button. A record appears below the form if the person is registered; if nothing comes back, recheck the ID type and number before drawing conclusions.

The page’s own instruction reads “diligencie la identificación o nombre y apellido de la persona a consultar” — fill in the identification or the name and surname. In practice the ID number is a required field, so a name-only search doesn’t go through. You need the number.

03How to get the surgeon’s cédula number

Ask the clinic for it, in writing, and say why. This is a normal request: the registry is public precisely so patients can check. A short message works:

A surgeon who trained in Colombia will usually have a cédula de ciudadanía. A foreign doctor living in Colombia would use a cédula de extranjería, which the form also accepts. Ask for the number of the surgeon who will actually operate — not the clinic director or the coordinator you’ve been messaging.

If the clinic refuses, stalls, or sends a certificate image instead of a number you can search, treat that as your answer. A photo of a diploma can’t be checked; a registry entry can.

04What does a ReTHUS record show?

The Ministry doesn’t publish a field-by-field description of the result screen. A third-party guide from the health-software company Medifolios, updated in August 2026, lists these fields³:

• Nombres — the registered name
• Tipo de programa — the type of program the qualification came from
• Origen de obtención del título — where the degree was obtained (Colombia or abroad)
• Profesión u ocupación — the profession or occupation
• Fecha de inicio del ejercicio — the date the person started practicing
• Acto administrativo — the administrative act that authorized practice
• Entidad que reporta — the body that reported the registration
• Sanciones — sanctions, if any

What to look for, in order. First, the name matches the surgeon you were quoted. Second, the profession is medicine (medicina), not nursing or another health occupation. Third, a specialist program is listed that matches what the clinic claims — for a plastic surgeon, plastic surgery. If the record shows only a general medical degree and no specialty, ask the clinic to explain before you go any further. Fourth, the sanctions area is empty.

A clean ReTHUS record means the doctor is registered to practice. It doesn’t rate skill or experience, and it doesn’t tell you where the doctor operates — that is what the REPS check is for.

05SCCP: is the surgeon a member of the plastic-surgery society?

The Sociedad Colombiana de Cirugía Plástica, Estética y Reconstructiva (SCCP) is the national plastic-surgery society; ISAPS lists it as its Colombian national society. Its member directory is public⁴:

cirugiaplastica.org.co/buscar-cirujano

1. Step 1Filter by city. Use the “Ciudades” filter — Medellín, Bogotá D.C, Cali, Cartagena and others.
2. Step 2Scan the list. Results are paginated. Each entry shows the surgeon’s name, email, practice cities and a link to a profile.
3. Step 3Cross-check. The name should match the ReTHUS record, and the practice city should match where the clinic says you’ll be operated on.

What it proves: the surgeon is listed by the national specialty society. Medellín’s official tourism guide advises visitors to verify “the professional’s credentials with the SCCP”¹⁰.

What it doesn’t prove: the directory page makes no statement about what membership requires, so don’t read more into it than a listing. Absence isn’t automatically disqualifying either — it is a question to put to the clinic. The regional federation FILACP keeps a separate Colombia member list you can check as a second source⁵.

06REPS: is the clinic authorized for your surgery?

A licensed surgeon can still operate in an unlicensed room. Colombia’s REPS — Registro Especial de Prestadores de Servicios de Salud — lists every provider the health authorities have authorized, under the licensing process called habilitación (Resolución 3100 de 2019)¹².

1. Step 1Open the portal at prestadores.minsalud.gov.co/habilitacion⁶.
2. Step 2Log in as a guest. The page says: “Si no tiene usuario ni contraseña, digite invitado en cada uno de los anteriores campos y luego pulse el botón ingresar.” Type invitado in both the user and password fields and press Ingresar.
3. Step 3Search for the clinic’s name. Use the provider search inside the portal. Search the legal name on your quote or invoice, which may differ from the brand name on Instagram.
4. Step 4Check the address. A provider can have several sites (sedes). The address where you’ll be operated on should be one of them.

We haven’t documented the screens after the guest login field by field, so we describe them only in general terms. If the portal gives you trouble, the same register is published as open data on datos.gov.co, where you can filter the NombrePrestador column by the clinic’s name without logging in⁷.

Recovery houses. Many casas de recuperación are lodging with nurses, not registered health providers. Medellín’s official tourism guide names a single post-operative recovery facility as licensed by the Antioquia health authority — its own claim, which we haven’t independently verified — and advises checking “the establishment’s licensing with the Antioquia Health Sectional”¹⁰. If a recovery house offers wound care or drains management, ask whether it appears in REPS. Our recovery stays guide covers what to ask.

07JCI: international hospital accreditation

Joint Commission International accredits hospitals against an international standard. It is voluntary, and most licensed clinics in Colombia don’t have it — so treat it as a plus, not a requirement. JCI’s live directory shows 11 accredited organizations in Colombia: in Bogotá, Medellín, Cali, Envigado and Floridablanca. None is in Cartagena⁸.

To check, open the JCI “Find accredited international organizations” page and filter by country. Each entry shows the organization type (hospital, academic medical center, ambulatory care) and an effective date. Our safety guide lists all eleven by city.

Keep the CDC’s caution in mind: accreditation “does not guarantee a good outcome”⁹. It tells you about the hospital’s systems — infection control, emergency response — not about the individual surgeon.

08Dentists and hair-transplant surgeons

ReTHUS covers dentistry (odontología), so the same ID-number lookup applies to a dentist. We found no separate public member lookup run by a Colombian dental association. The Colegio Colombiano de Odontólogos handles some delegated public functions, such as transitory permits for foreign dentists, but ReTHUS is the check that matters.

Hair restoration is practiced by doctors from more than one specialty, so an SCCP listing won’t apply to every hair surgeon. ReTHUS still does: confirm the doctor is a registered physician, and that the clinic is in REPS. See our hair transplant guide and dental implant guide for the procedure-specific questions.

09Red flags checklist

10Spanish mini-glossary

The terms you’ll meet on the government portals and in clinic paperwork.

One last step the CDC recommends for every medical traveler: get your complete medical records, in English, before you return home⁹. Ask for the historia clínica at discharge, not by email weeks later.