Anesthesia to get a tattoo? A Florida studio mixes medicine and ink. (2025)

Miami is a destination for patients seeking cancer treatment, organ transplants and Brazilian butt lifts.

Dom Groenveld also traveled six hours from Michigan to be put under anesthesia in the 305.

“I’m getting six sessions of tattooing done all at once,” Groenveld said.

It can take nearly 50 hours, spaced out across eight six-hour sessions over the period of a year, to complete a detailed back tattoo. But under anesthesia, with a team of five tattoo artists working together, it only took Groenveld seven hours total to get inked.

“I’ll feel the aftermath, just like any other person getting a tattoo will feel, but I will not feel it during, and that was definitely a part of the puzzle for me,” Groenveld said in a phone interview ahead of his January ink session.

The tattooing session unfolded inside an ambulatory surgery center in South Miami under the supervision of a board-certified anesthesiologist hired by Miami-based Sedation Ink.

The company says it’s one of three locations in the U.S. that offers tattooing under sedation, a process meant to give clients and artists the ability to complete large and time-consuming tattoos quicker, and with less pain.

People don’t feel pain under anesthesia because the meds temporarily block signals from the nerves to the brain.

“The whole idea of ‘I want to endure the pain to get the ink because that’s just how it is’ — I think that’s slowly becoming obsolete,” said Miami resident Michael Zuratti, who co-founded the company with Eileen Margolis, who has worked in Miami healthcare.

Zuratti and Margolis said their idea for anesthesia-assisted tattooing was born from Zuratti’s own lengthy and painful journey to complete his arm and leg tattoos. The business began operating last year, state records show.

Sedation tattooing is a relatively new and somewhat unregulated pricey spin on body art, with sessions costing several thousands of dollars. While some tattoo studios might offer numbing cream, people usually don’t get general anesthesia for tattoos.

Florida requires tattoo artists, including those who do microblading and other permanent cosmetic tattoos, to be licensed and do the body art at a licensed tattoo establishment. In Florida, only select licensed health professionals can administer general anesthesia, including anesthesiologists, certified registered nurse anesthetists, oral surgeons, and dentists with sedation permits.

Sedation Ink is like a hybrid version of the two specialties, with tattoo artists working alongside medical doctors. Florida law doesn’t say what this type of hybrid business should and should not do to ensure patient safety. That’s why Sedation Ink says it’s working with the Florida Department of Health and the Florida Board of Medicine to craft regulations for the new industry.

The Florida Department of Health did not immediately respond to the Miami Herald’s request for comment.

Are there risks to tattoos under sedation?

Besides the risk of infections, allergic reactions, scarring and other skin problems — which can happen with regular tattooing — sedation tattooing also carries anesthesia risks. Anesthesia is generally safe, but there’s always a chance something could go wrong.

Brazilian car influencer Ricardo Godoi went into cardiac arrest and died at 45 after he was sedated for a back tattoo in Brazil. He wasn’t a Sedation Ink client.

For now, Sedation Ink attorney Noel Pace, who specializes in health law, said the company is following regulations for tattoo studios and Level III office surgeries, which involves general anesthesia and pre-surgery sedation. Sedation Ink rents space and blocks out time at various ambulatory surgery centers across Miami-Dade for its tattoo sessions. Clients are also required to undergo a medical evaluation, including blood test, ahead of the session. Sedation Ink says it has never had a safety issue or scare with clients.

But unlike elective surgery, a doctor isn’t cutting skin. The tattoo artist is “tickling your skin” with a needle, just like if you were at a regular tattoo studio, the founders said. And there’s a medical team on hand to handle the anesthesia.

“Women have been doing elective surgeries and elective procedures for decades and I really think that the guys are going to start looking at this — instead of a mommy makeover, it’s like a dude makeover,” Margolis said.

In some ways, the Sedation Ink attorney describes sedation tattooing as similar to permanent makeup and medical tattooing, or micropigmentation, which is meant to cover scars and help people feel and look like themselves again. Medical tattooing, for example, is sometimes offered to cancer patients who undergo mastectomy and reconstruction surgery.

“Is a tattoo a surgery? That’s the question that needs to be asked” and answered, said Pace, Sedation’s attorney and a former Army combat medic and medical service officer. “We, in being prudent, have been approaching this from a surgical perspective, not from a tattooing perspective” to make sure clear and safe regulations will be created.

“We’re focusing on healthcare and providing an outlet for people to tell their story through body art, but to do it safely and effectively,” he added.

Safety was top of mind for 36-year-old Groenveld, who flew down from Michigan in January to cover up an old back tattoo he got at 18 of an eagle with the words “I fly solo.” His new ink shows off several apex predators, including a snapping gator and a snarling wolf.

Cost: $40,000.

“So what I’m really doing is trading my dollars for the time,” Groenveld said.

He completed his back tattoo during one seven-hour session instead of eight lengthy sessions spread out across the year.

Sedation Ink usually recommends people who travel to Miami for tattooing stay at a nearby hotel for three nights. The company offers discounted hotel reservations and provides other concierge services, including airport pickup and assistance with pain medication. Clients who want a VIP concierge experience can book a package that includes a stay at the historic Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables.

It was a good thing Groenveld didn’t fly home right away. Besides feeling like he had a “bad sunburn,” Groenveld dealt with waves of nausea —a common side affect from the anesthesia — for much of the night after waking up from his anesthesia-induced sleep.

“That first night of sleep was rough, but when I woke up, I was feeling better,” Groenveld said, noting he took prescribed pain and nausea medication the first night.

For others, like 31-year-old Abigail Aiken, the initial recovery period went smoother. Aiken, a member of the U.S. Navy’s Seabees, traveled to Miami from Houston last year to get her chest, stomach and part of an arm inked in one session.

“I woke up and I was like, ‘Dang, you know, I got a bad sunburn, that’s what it felt like,” said Aiken, who stayed in Miami for a few days to recover before flying back home. She said the experience was worth the $25,000 she spent to memorialize parts of her life, including the year her grandfather died, her wife’s name and designs that reflect her years of military service, including time spent in the Middle East.

Aiken and Groenveld say the money spent, and the initial discomfort, was all worth flying back home with finished tattoos.

“I’m a firm believer that time is money and money equals time and freedom,” Groenveld said several weeks after his tattoo session.

Would he do it again, even with the nausea?

“If I had to pick, ‘Hey, do I want four days of flying down, discomfort getting the tattoo and then just be done?’” or undergo months of tattoo sessions, “I would take the four days all over again,” he said. “So yes, absolutely, it was worth it.”