You don't have to look far for walking adverts of the perils of cosmetic surgery.

In recent years, the permanently surprised looking Joan Rivers has built her stand-up routine on her various nips, tucks and lifts, Leslie Ash still bears the scars of her infamous trout pout six years after disastrous polymer injections to her lips and glossy magazines are full of celebrities confessing to a botox habit bordering on addiction.

Despite the cautionary tales, where celebrities have led the rest of us have followed.

Cosmetic surgery clinics, once the preserve of a wealthy elite, have made their presence felt on the high street with quick and easy solutions.

The market research firm Mintel has estimated the UK's cosmetic surgery industry is worth around £900m each year and that, according to the British Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons, is the problem.

The drive to make money, says BAAPS, has led to a glut of "irresponsible" sales techniques and yesterday it decided to name and shame the guilty clinics. Among the catalogue of offending adverts compiled by the organisation was one by West One Cosmetic Clinics, which has a base in Wakefield.

The advert for breast enlargement features a model whose figure the BAAPS described as "anatomically impossible" and while the company said it would take any criticisms "very seriously", it wasn't the only culprit.

A second advert offering a £250 discount to customers who had the surgery quickly was criticised for coercing clients into making quick decisions at the expense of proper consultation and a third was deemed to have made unrealistic promises about lunchtime facelifts.

"This lady's bottom appears very slim compared to her top," said Douglas McGeorge, current president of BAAPS and himself a consultant plastic surgeon.

"But if you look closely it's abnormal. If a woman with that figure had that body we know she would have to engage in years of corrective surgery

"We have become increasingly concerned about the standard and style of today's cosmetic surgery advertising.

"Surgery is a serious undertaking which requires realistic expectations and should only proceed after proper consultation with a reputable and properly qualified clinician in a clinical setting.

"A list of celebrity clientele isn't a professional qualification and while it would be lovely to have a lunchtime facelift, it simply does not exist."

As well as complaining to the Advertising Standards Authority, the BAAPS has now designed its own advert which will be placed in magazines warning people of the potential health risks if they fail to do their homework about cosmetic surgery.

"We are particularly worried by younger, vulnerable readers who have been heavily targeted," added Mr McGeorge.

"Patients should not go for the glossy before and after adverts. They should go for straight answers from a clinic – how many times have you performed this procedure and what is the complication rate?

"It's terribly easy to check the qualifications of surgeons, but few people do."

However, with the number of breast enlargements increasing three-fold in five years to 6,497 in 2007 and a rise in cosmetic tourism, the BAAPS faces an uphill struggle.

Nigel Mercer, president-elect of the association, said he has been performing corrective surgery on a patient who paid £650 for breast implant surgery in Thailand – the price included their flights and accommodation.

Another patient arrived at his clinic following a "disastrous" facelift in a developing country. The skin had been pulled so tight around her face, there was nothing that could be done to put it right.

"Sometime soon somebody will die after going on a surgery safari," he said.

"Some firms offer lower prices for multiple procedures. I know of one patient who underwent a facelift, tummy tuck and breast surgery under the same general anaesthetic.

"Even in this country there are clinics offering finance deals to prospective patients, providing loans at a high rate of interest to fund surgery.

"We are not saying we are the good guys and they are the bad guys. What we are saying is that if a patient comes to us, we will sit down with them and form a treatment plan over a period
of time.

"How you pitch to a patient and how a patient pitches to you is very important."

However, when even Leslie Ash, who has been told it is impossible to completely reverse the procedure which left the area between her nose and top lip rock hard, refuses to rule out further surgery, you know you've got a problem.

The Men Behaving Badly actress, who suffered public ridicule following the botched injections, recently told OK! magazine that despite the heartache it hadn't put her off having more procedures in
the future.

Sadly, when it comes to cosmetic surgery, Pandora's box has been opened and even the BAAPS will have a difficult job to shut it.