"Fix My Breast Implants Please"

Breasts are different between women and sides. This is just a fact of life. When we reconstruct women after breast cancer with implants or even augment a woman with implants for cosmetic concerns, we deal with a degree of dissimilarity between her breasts.

A basic question with any cosmetic procedure involving paired body parts is:

Each woman has her own answer to this question. The women below were both originally operated by other surgeons. Each sought an improvement of her breast implant result to further improve the similarity between her breasts. Fine tuning can be successful with careful planning and execution.

REPAIR OF THE LOWER BREAST FOLD

"P" had had both breasts removed for cancer with tissue expander type reconstructions. Her surgical history had spanned a decade as the mastectomy surgery was not done all at once. She returned to her original plastic surgeon asking about improvement of her right lower breast fold. He told her to live with it feeling that she had a good result and would not benefit by further surgery. She then found her way to me for a second opinion. Surgery to raise the lower breast fold is straight-forward. The question is really whether or not the problem will recur. It can. The lady was willing to take the risk feeling restricted in her choice of clothing by the differences in the breasts. At left she is pre-op and at the right nine months later. The result is stable to this point. We later revised her areolar margins to make them more similar.

ONE-SIDED MODIFIED LIFT / IMPLANT EXCHANGE

"J" had many years previously had silicone gel breast implants placed in the "Over the Muscle" position for cosmetic improvement. A recent mammogram revealed that her right implant had ruptured. She was unhappy with the discrepancy between the breasts in the position of the breast mound, the areola and the relative large size of her right areola. She desired that only the right implant be removed and exchanged for a saline filled model. This was placed in a submuscular position. At the same time, we performed a right modified breast lift to improve the position and size (reduction) of the nipple/areolar complex. At the right she is seen two months out from surgery happy with the improvement. The surgical scars have yet to fade at this point but the symmetry is improved.