by Dr. Gabrielle Young, M.D.

Today, at BreastImplants-Info.com, we’re taking this opportunity to showcase an article written by both a plastic surgeon and former breast augmentation patient, Dr. Gabrielle Young. Given her unique perspective on the procedure, we felt it would offer our readership great insight into the science behind breast implants, having elective cosmetic surgery in a recession and the social pressures of looking “just right” that teenage girls and young women face daily. (Special thanks to TampaBay.com / St. Petersburg Times.)

Here’s one possible upside to the economic downturn: Fewer teenage girls are getting breast implants.

According to the American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery, 4,108 girls ages 18 and under had the procedure in 2008, compared with 7,882 the year before. Given the current economic outlook, 2009 may see further declines.

But as a doctor who has breast implants myself, I find it shocking that so many girls whose bodies are still developing are undergoing major surgery they do not need and may not fully understand. And I’m even more stunned that parents who should know better are indulging their daughters.

The physical risks of the procedure are well documented. Studies by implant manufacturers show that many breast implant recipients have at least one serious complication within the first three years, including infections, bruises, fluid collections, capsular contracture (painful hardening of the breasts), disfiguring scars, loss of nipple sensation, substantial stretch marks, irreversible thinning of the skin and migration of the implant.

Breast implants can interfere with self-examinations and mammograms, making early cancer detection far tougher. Implants also can make breast-feeding difficult or impossible.

Painful Choice to Advance Career

When I was 25, an aspiring model, it became clear that my B-cup breasts weren’t going to get me where I wanted to go in my career. So I opted for a conservative augmentation, to a C-cup.

I was expecting some discomfort after the surgery. No one prepared me for the feeling of constant sledgehammers crushing my breasts.

I had chosen to have my implants placed under the muscle, meaning my pectoral muscle was cut to place the implant in the proper position, to give my breasts a more natural look and feel.

It actually felt like my chest had been placed in a vise and squeezed. I had to be in a cloud of narcotic medications just to make it through the day.

My breasts were so swollen, I looked like I was wearing a personal flotation device for an emergency plane landing. I could not pick up a 3-pound weight, drive to get groceries or even put on lipstick for more than two weeks.

Once the pain ebbed, I was pleased with my new C-size breasts. They were ideal for my frame. But I allowed myself to be convinced by other swimsuit and fitness models that I should go bigger — all the way to double Ds. I was not discouraged by my plastic surgeon, but I don’t know that I could have been talked out of it anyway.

I had the second surgery less than a year later. The pain was worse the second time around. Despite that, I was happy with the results, because I thought it was what I needed to be a model.

Projecting the Wrong Image

Now I am a doctor, and my swimsuit-model figure doesn’t project the image I want to have.

Here’s just one of many stories I could tell: As a resident physician, I was speaking with a terminally ill patient about his treatment options. When I looked up at my attending physician, he was staring at my double Ds, which I had tried to conceal beneath two compressing sports bras and baggy surgical scrubs. The patient asked him if he agreed with my comments, and he could only blush. He had no idea what I had said.

The decision to go bigger was for the short-term goal of advancing my modeling career. I did not anticipate the long-term effects it would have on my professional life. No matter where I go, or what I say, people still look at me like I am a porn star, not a doctor.

And, like all breast implant recipients, I am facing surgery to have them replaced one day, because implants do not come with a lifetime guarantee. But I won’t change sizes, as once an implant is placed it is difficult to change sizes.

It’s Parents’ Job to Say ‘No’

From the time they can turn on the television, our children are bombarded with images of kids growing up too fast, images like Lindsay Lohan, Britney Spears, and My Super Sweet Sixteen. It’s hardly surprising if girls feel like they are waging an internal war over beauty and self-esteem. And if they decide a quick little operation can help, and their parents won’t say no, who will stop them?

Most surgeons won’t perform augmentations on girls. In fact, the American Society of Plastic Surgeons doesn’t even track statistics on implants for girls under 18, since the group has taken a position against the practice. But clearly, not everyone is following suit.

These are our daughters, and the future professional women of our country. They are not specimens to be cut with a scalpel and modified simply to help them gain social acceptance or, even worse, self-acceptance.

If economic reality is helping more parents say no to young girls who want bigger breasts, that’s a good thing. But the economy will turn around eventually. Will parental responsibility turn with it?

Dr. Gabrielle Young recently completed her residency at the University of Louisville and is an osteopath. She plans to practice in the Tampa Bay area. For more information, visit her Web site, www.drgabrielleyoung.com.

Allergan, Inc., a breast implants manufacturer and worldwide leader in the body rejuvenation industry, is reemphasizing assurance in women considering breast augmentation to be highly informed before their first plastic surgery consultation by introducing The Natrelle™ Pre-Consultation Kit. It is an answer for both women starting out, and plastic surgeons that want the right information in the hands of prospective patients.

The kit is a thorough, thoughtful and elegant package for every woman starting the process of achieving a new body image through breast augmentation. It is an intimate, at-home preparation for face-to-face consultations with plastic surgeons, and an ideal resource for patients to set a size goal. The Natrelle™ Pre-Consultation Kit was developed with the help of two of America’s most prominent plastic surgeons, who participated in the kit’s orientation video featuring an informative actual breast exam.

Mr. Jeffrey Moore of communications firm 3v07, and director/producer for the program, established that the Natrelle™ Pre-Consultation Kit’s primary driver must be an elegant approach for selecting what size implant each patient would like to set as their goal.

“This is such a personal, life-long decision that it is hard to believe that until this Natrelle™ Pre-Consultation Kit many women would set a goal for their new profile by filling plastic sandwich bags with rice or hair gel to get an idea of what size they would like to be. A search of the Internet turns up one resource after another recommending this process. At best, some may take 20 minutes in a doctor’s office to determine their goal. Our first principal in development of the kit was to assure that size selection is now a personal, fun, at home experience women could take their time with.” Mr. Moore goes on to say, “The Natrelle™ Pre-Consultation Kit size selection experience is elegant and complete. Women are provided with a beautiful bra and 4 different breast implant-like sizers to assure they are comfortable with their breast enhancement before starting the process. This is a great solution for both women and their doctors.”

Contemporary research clearly shows that practicaly every woman begins her path to breast augmentation by doing some form of research on the web. With the decision to offer this kit prominently through web services offered by Allergan and Natrelle™ patients can be empowered to approach their initial consultation confidently. The kit provides an excellent look at the initial consultation and covers each topic a woman will discuss with her doctor, giving her the perspective to make informed decisions. This includes styles of breast implants, incision choices and profile choices.

The Natrelle™ Pre-Consultation Kit features a DVD orienting patients to the process of getting a new profile, a discussion brochure for the information they will cover with their Plastic Surgeon and a breast sizing system with a special brassiere and trial implants. The kit also includes a $50 rebate for Natrelle™ gel implants and $120 in savings on the Allergan aesthetic products BOTOX® Cosmetic (botulinum toxin type A), JUVEDERM™, LATISSE™ (bimatoprost ophthalmic solution) 0.03%.

The Natrelle™ Pre-Consultation Kit is $39.95 and available to patients only via the Internet at www.Natrelle.com starting April 1, 2009.

Madrid – A Spanish man has been arrested and accused of using veterinary equipment to perform cosmetic surgery.

Catalonian regional police say they arrested the 63-year-old Barcelona native for allegedly practicing medicine without a license in filthy conditions at his home. The police statement says the illegitimate doctor worked in the company of his three dogs, a cat and a parrot.

The police say in a statement released this past Wednesday that the man charged his human patients between €250 and €500 ($330 and $660, USD) to perform breast augmentation and buttock implants, using veterinary tools normally used to inject animals.

It is also believed the man was administering direct injections of liquid silicone, without the benefit of using actual implants.

Police arrested the man on Friday after authorities received a complaint about a defective breast implant.

Researchers in Britain have found a new application for the highly controversial Stem Cell Therapy: Breast Augmentation!

No area of research in the medical and scientific communities has created as much of a debate as stem cell therapy. Despite the positive research results that stem cells have the potential to treat many different types of conditions including stroke, paralysis and birth defects, there is much contention surrounding the use of embryonic stem cells.

More recent stem cell research being conducted, however, is focusing on using (non-embryonic) stem cells derived from the patient’s own body. This research has shown promise for a variety of medical therapy options, including treating brain injuries in rats.

Thus far, scientists in the UK have been working on the new method exclusively for treating women with breast deformities caused by cancer and its subsequent treatment. The process involves harvesting stem cells from fat located around the woman’s stomach or thighs using highly specialized equipment. The stem cells than can then be mixed with another batch of fat from the patient’s body before being injected into the breasts.

The researchers claim that it can take several months before the breast achieves the desired shape and size. Researcher and breast augmentation consultant Professor Kefah Mokbel from the London Breast Institute, who is in charge of the project, will treat 10 patients from May. He predicts private patients will be able to pay for the procedure within about six months, at a cost of about £6,500 (approximately $9500.00, USD).

“This is a very exciting advance in breast surgery,” said Mokbel. “They [breasts treated with stem cells] feel more natural because this tissue has the same softness as the rest of the breast. Implants are a foreign body. They are associated with long-term complications and require replacement. They can also leak and cause scarring.”

Not all medical professionals are in agreement, however, that the new technique is quite ready for public use. Says Los Angeles plastic surgeon, Dr. Steven Teitelbaum, M.D.:

“Everyone expects to see major advances in these areas in the coming years,” “No doubt, this is the future of plastic surgery. But it is not yet the present.”

The use of stem cells in healthy women undergoing cosmetic plastic surgery is controversial, to say the very least. Medical boards and top physicians alike have warned that the breast enlargements should not be offered to healthy women until large-scale trials in cancer patients have shown that the new procedure is safe and effective. The treatment is not yet available to women solely for cosmetic purposes.

Eva Weiler-Mithoff, a consultant and plastic surgeon at Canniesburn hospital in Glasgow, is co-leading the British wing of a European trial of stem cell therapy for women who have been left with post-cancer breast deformities. So far more than a dozen British cancer patients have been treated and Weiler-Mithoff is impressed with the results. She does not believe this justifies offering the treatment to healthy women, however. According to Weiler-Mithoff, while breast cancer patients regularly attend follow-up appointments, young women who have had cosmetic surgery are less likely to do so and complications could be missed.

The same technique, however, has been used in Japan for six years, initially to treat women with breast deformities caused by cancer treatment and, more recently, for cosmetic breast augmentation in healthy women.

Until now, when fat was transplanted to the breast without extra stem cells (a procedure commonly known as fat grafting or transfer), surgeons had difficulty maintaining a blood supply to the new tissue. Surgeons believe the increased concentration of stem cells under this technique promotes the growth of blood vessels to ensure a sufficient blood supply circulates to the transplanted fat cells.

Mokbel is confident the therapy is safe and that, after carrying out about 30 procedures, the London Breast Institute will be able to offer the procedure to private patients. Mokbel says that he believes only modest increases in size can be achieved using the stem cell process and points out that only gains in cup size will be made, no improvement in firmness and uplift will be achieved. Or not yet, at least.

Far too often, in the world of breast augmentation, much attention and emphasis is placed on the size of the breast implant and not its location. This issue is one that has profound yet differing long-term affects for the patient, so it is important that it is addressed.

Patients typically have two choices when it comes to implant placement: subglandular and submuscular. Subglandular implants are placed underneath the breast tissue, yet above the chest wall muscles, whereas submuscular implants are placed below the chest (pectoral) muscles. Occasionally, a third procedure option is available that allows a patient to have the implant placed partially under the muscle wall.

Frequently, when it comes to implant placement, most surgeons and patients opt for subglandular for a variety of reasons, including the relative ease (compared to submuscular placement) of the procedure on both doctor and patient. Many women are happy and are more than eligible to have their breast augmentation done in such a way.

However, submuscular implant placement presents many benefits to the patient, including:

• Lower occurrence of capsular contracture
• Lower chance of rippling
• Less interference with future mammograms
• Less visible Implant
• More natural appearance and feel to the breast
• Better results for women with small breasts

Capsular contracture is a condition where a “capsule” of scar tissue forms around the breast implants and constricts the implant in an unnatural fashion. This creates a hardened look to the breasts and is potentially painful for the patient. Treating capsular contracture requires that the implants and scar tissue be removed and the implants replaced. Capsular contracture occurs far less frequently with submuscular implants.

The other primary benefit to submuscular implantation is that more of the implant is covered by more muscle tissue, reducing the likelihood of visible implant rippling. This creates a much more natural look to a patient’s implants.

Additionally, submuscular implantation creates less interference with mammography. Because the implants are placed below the breast’s glandular tissue and muscle, and the glandular tissue is what is being examined during a mammogram, imaging is more accurate.

As always, even though submuscular breast implants have many advantages, only you and your plastic surgeon will know what is the best technique for you. Many factors, such as age, body type, implant type and intended results factor into which technique will be best for you. Always be sure to thoroughly discuss your breast augmentation with your plastic surgeon.

There are probably few things scarier than discovering an un-diagnosed but life-threatening medical condition. Being the only person in the world to ever suffer from such a condition would make most people downright petrified!

This was the case for a Florida woman — a condition so rare that it has no medical name — her heart was found to be moving around in her body. Doctors found it stuck in her rib cage under her kidney, on its side.

According to local news reports, the 35-year-old woman was born prematurely and has suffered numerous life-long complications, including an underdeveloped and diseased lung. The lung was removed when she was only 4 years old but not before the disease had spread to the remaining lung. As an adult, she’s had to endure chronic lung disease, which triggers chronic asthma, chronic bronchitis and chronic pneumonia. An onset, treatable for most adults, could easily send her to the emergency room. The empty lung cavity is what allowed her heart to shift and float in her body.

Because her doctors had never seen the condition before, they were initially at a loss to come up with a treatment. One doctor said the patient was the only person in the world with the disorder. Doctors were left to ponder the course of action for this situation. The solution? Breast implants.

“She calls herself a freak of nature because most doctors she’s seen have never seen this condition before,” according to her husband.

It required a four and one-half hour operation, she describes as life-saving, but breast implants — used in the traditional breast augmentation procedure — successfully filled the space where the lung used to be and holds the heart in the correct position.

In spite of the degenerative nature of her condition, she remains upbeat and positive, even though her health is deteriorating exponentially faster than a healthy adult of the same age.

“I coughed, sneezed and farted all at the same time and broke six ribs a few months ago. I guess it’s a talent,” she says with a hearty laugh. “They say I’ll eventually sever my spinal cord, but that’s okay, I’ll just run people over with my wheelchair and leave tire marks to prove I was there,” she added, also saying that she wants her chair motorized with a horn.

One of the UK’s largest cosmetic surgery providers, The Harley Medical Group, have released new figures that reveal 75% of women who have had a Breast Augmentation procedure in the last six months opted to go up just one or two cup sizes.

The new figures reflect the less-is-more attitude now taken by many celebrities, with many women now opting for a more natural look.

The new sort of breast augmentation patients, keen to keep things in proportion, are going for the “lower profile implant” in favor of two other available breast implant shapes – the “contoured” breast implants, which are designed to reflect the slope of the breast and the “round high profile”, which produces a more rounded appearance to the upper breast.

The Brittish medical group also reveals that breast enlargement remains the most popular of all cosmetic surgery procedures, making up 30% of all procedures across its 23 clinics.

“The ‘Boob Job’ has always been the most popular cosmetic surgery procedure we perform. These days women come to us looking for a natural result, not a look-at-me statement d colletage, which can sometimes cause too much attention. Contrary to popular belief, most cosmetic surgery patients want to fit in – not stand out!” according to Liz Dale, Director of The Harley Medical Group.

According to new reports from the American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery, almost 400,000 breast augmentations were performed in 2007 — an increase from previous numbers since silicone breast implants were approved by the FDA in 2006. Still, many women are still choosing saline breast implants, known as the “workhorse” of breast enlargement surgery.

One of the many benefits of saline breast implants for breast augmentation is the many different saline profiles and shapes available, which allows your doctor to achieve a better match to your individual body frame.

Saline breast implants also have a flexible fill volume, and are not prefilled. This provides more options for incision placement, as well as a smaller incision necessary for the breast enhancement surgery.Because saline implants are filled after insertion, their final volume can be adjusted making it easier for the surgeon to correct for existing breast asymmetry.

Saline breast implants are widely endorsed by plastic surgeons for women who need correction for asymmetry, or that have reservations about silicone breast implants. Each patient is different however, and you should always consider the option that is best suited for your body type.The best way to be certain is to consult your plastic surgeon (or 2, or even 3) and find out which breast implants will work best for your breast augmentation.

Fountain, Colorado. There are more strange elements surfacing related to what police say was a botched murder for hire attempt. The apparent goal was getting money for breast implants.

Eighteen year old Nikita Weis allegedly offered to pay two men a total of seven thousand dollars to break into his own home, kill his mother, and steal her money and car. Police say it was all to pay for breast augmentation surgery for his girlfriend, twenty-one year old Sophia Alsept.

Juan Antonio Velez Gonzalez, 18, is accused of striking Weis’ mother in the head with a baseball bat, while Brandon Soroka, 19, waited outside during the attack, acting as lookout and driver.

When police questioned Weis and his girlfriend there stories didn’t match. During further questioning the story came out. Charges include attempted murder and kidnapping.

Court records show Nikita Weis had been bailed out of jail by his mother a couple of weeks earlier for attempted kidnapping with a deadly weapon. The victim listed is the girlfriend in this case.

Beverly Hills plastic surgeon Dr. Athleo Louis Cambre does a pretty good job answering many frequently asked questions concerning breast augmentation surgery.

Besides the normal ‘what is breast augmentation’ and ‘am I a good candidate’ questions, he covers breast implant surgery options such as incision location and implant type as well as surgery risks and recovery time.

Unfortunately there are no mentions of typical costs and the cost of breast implants is an often asked question.

Scroll down to the bottom of his breast surgery page and there are quite a few before and after breast augmentation photos.