I saw two consults today who had previous breast implant surgery and came to me wanting new, bigger implants. During our discussion, it became evident that both women thought that changing their implants (”re-doing” their augmentation surgery) would improve their breast shape. It doesn’t. Changing implants, called an implant exchange, simply removes the old set and replaces them with a new pair of implants, possibly of a different size or material. Going with bigger implants makes you bigger and adds more upper fullness, but doesn’t improve breast shape, doesn’t increase cleavage, doesn’t manage sagging, and, as a general rule, does not make breasts look better. What I commonly see are women wanting the look achieved with a breast lift, but hoping that an implant exchange alone will accomplish this. It just doesn’t. After some nice discussion with pictures to assist in the explanantion, both women realized that a lift, or mastopexy, was the procedure that would really make them happy and that a breast augmentation ”re-do” surgery wouldn’t suffice alone. It was a lot of fun getting on the same page as these women. Many days like today, I really enjoy the process of a consultation with some very thoughtful, nice people.
Dr. Steven Vath
