Safer Breast Implants

The solution to safer breast implants may be in the solution itself. Researchers believe they've found a way to get rid of the most common risk associated with breast implant surgery. Here's how the solution works.

Award-winning dog breeder Susie thought the time was right to make a change. Just before her 45th birthday, she got breast implants.

Susie says, "I wanted to be a 'C' rather than a 'B'. I wanted to be proportionate. I didn't want for someone to look at me and say, 'Oh, she's just had surgery.'"

Susie knew there were risks but says she felt safer about the operation because of a solution developed by William Adams, Jr., M.D., who explains, "It's a combination of three antibiotics, and it's mixed up precisely."

This mixture fights the bacteria doctors suspect causes a condition called capsular contracture, which hardens the scar tissue around the implant.

Dr. Adams says, "It can be an actual functional problem that hurts, and then as the capsule thickens it can interfere with detection or reading mammograms."

To prevent complications like these, Dr. Adams soaks the surgical site and the implant itself. He hopes using the solution will become standard practice. "Now we have a solution, no pun intended, to the problem and hopefully can now take that back to patients to give them safer and better results," he says.

So far, surgeons in Dallas have used the solution on more than 200 women with no reported problems.

Susie says, "It was easy, I was back lifting weights, working out, and chasing my dogs in a limited amount of time."

Researchers say the solution seems to be effective in both breast augmentation and reconstruction. Final evaluation of the solution will take three to five years.

Source: Ivanhoe @ 2000