What are the different kinds of breast implants?
Hi I’m doctor Dan Shapiro a board-certified plastic surgeon certified by the American Board of plastic surgery I’ve been practicing here in Scottsdale Paradise Valley for over 21 years.
Today I’m going to talk about one of the different kinds of implants that you can have. If you’re thinking about a breast augmentation back in the early 90s silicone was taken off the market and it’s been shown that there’s no cause and effect relationship between silicon and the disease. So they were brought back in the market close to ten years ago. There are still some patients that can have a saline implant or silicone implant, most patients request a silicone implant these days because I think that they look and they feel better.
The different kinds of implants that are placed and generally I place the implants beneath the pectoralis muscle. Varying from saline to silicone and the silicone implants now versus earlier models are what we call low bleed or cohesive ge. You’ve probably heard of the term “gummy bear implant†almost all of them now are some variation of gummy bear implant. Which means if you cut it the the silicone will not leak. It’s like a jelly so that kind of concern with patients should really be no longer.
With regards to shape it really depends upon what a patient’s needs are. The way to think about it is that you can have a implant that looks more like a pancake which we really don’t use anymore. One that we call moderate profile which is probably the most common implant that I use. That has a moderate shape here and that looks as though the dome on the implant is not so pronounced. Then there is the high-profile implant that if you see these are both about the same size and one implant has more of a dome and actually has more volume to it than the other implant. A high-profile implant as opposed to a monitor profile implant would be used as someone who a bit of droopiness in there breast or has a narrow chest. A common person that would need a high-profile implant, is maybe an Asian patient who has a very slight body stature. We want to put an implant that gives nice size but doesn’t exceed that width so she doesn’t look too busty. The other kind of implant that is becoming more prevalent now is the anatomic or tear dropped implant. In the past we use those but they weren’t as good because the silicone that was used in them prior was more prone to ripple now the implants that we talked about are the cohesive gel of a gummy bear, and they tend not to ripple, stand in place, and maintain their shape.
Who was a good candidate for a gummy bear or anatomic implant? That would be someone who has really no breast tissue or has a minimal ptosis or droopiness. A lot of patients that come in that have no breast tissue and look flat are great candidates for this. Because the end result looks much more natural with less superior fullness. The best way to figure out what your options are is to come in for consultation bringing pictures of breasts that you like and we can talk our way through it take some measurements to give you an idea about what’s best for you. Thanks a lot.
