A woman in her early 20’s who described herself as a 34 A cup and wanted to be a full C cup if possible but still natural in appearance. She is 5’4” and 135 lbs. and is shown before and again, 6 weeks after bilateral partial subpectoral breast augmentation with the Sientra Opus 5 th generation cohesive gel round smooth moderate plus 325 cc implant placed through an inframammary incision (at the breast fold).
Discussion: Her breast width is 12.5 cm and the fold to nipple distance is just 5.5 cm but increases to 8 cm on manual stretch. The Sientra 325 moderate plus implant is 11.8 cm at the base. This fits within her measured base width so the breasts will not look overly round after augmentation. The nipple to fold distance on stretch of 8 cm would theoretically allow an implant base of up to 12 cm without being overly full on top. She is still at some risk of “bottoming out” if the inframammary fold ligament were to detach from the extra pressure of the implant so I reinforced the fold at the time of surgery with slowly dissolving but strong anchoring sutures. This allows us to use the largest possible implant that will fit her measurements without appearing unnatural. On close observation you may notice nipple piercings before surgery. I ask patients to remove these at the time of surgery and never replace them because I think it can increase the risk of capsular contracture. The nipple ducts, like the mouth and vagina have bacteria and a piercing in these areas may allow bacteria to enter the blood stream, travel to the implant and lead to bacterial contamination of the implant with biofilm and a subsequent capsular contracture. Piercings in other areas without bacteria such as the umbilicus, do not seem to have the same issue.
Cosmetic & Plastic Surgery Specialist
"I treat my patients like I would treat
- Jonathan D. Hall, MD, FACSmembers of my own family."
Schedule Consultation