Plastic Surgery Blog

When women are deciding about whether they want to explore breast implants as an option for improving their body aesthetic, they often pay more attention to other women’s breasts - particularly models or celebrities - to get an idea for the possibilities. A wish list is what many of our patients call it. If you’re going to take a chance on finally getting the breasts you want, you want to have a good idea of what breasts those are. Makes sense, right?

There are, however, some pitfalls in choosing your breasts from a catalog, a magazine, or a picture of another woman found online. Here are several to consider when you’re considering your wish list:

It can be difficult to separate overall beauty and good looking breasts. Often what attracts your eye to a specific picture might not involve a woman’s breasts at all. It might be the lighting, the setting, what the people are doing, or the emotional response the photographer is trying to elicit. While breast augmentation can give you a fuller, perkier breasts, it won’t change your face, make your hair fuller, longer, or curlier, or add six inches to your height. It’s important to focus on the improvements you want made to your breasts.

Photographs frequently are faked. You may be looking at a picture of a woman whose body type is similar to yours and has also had breast implants. But if that picture is airbrushed or photoshopped, you’re not seeing what her breasts really look like, only an ideal of what the person who designed the image you’re viewing thought she should look like.

Clothing can complicate or obscure. Your new breasts will look different clothed or unclothed, in a bikini, in a push-up bra, or covered by layers of fabric. Comparing those breasts to another woman’s breasts when they are obscured by clothing is the ultimate in apples to oranges.

The above video from the American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery beautifully illustrates another reason we hear from our patients about why they are considering breast implants: the difference it will make in how they wear their clothes.

Feeling beautiful in your own skin and the clothes you choose to wear is something some people never experience, but many of our patients say that they are more confident in their appearance and more likely to be social after cosmetic surgery because they finally feel attractive to others. Very few people are blessed with perfect figures, and while clothes can and are designed to minimize figure flaws and play up personal strengths, knowing that, underneath the clothes, their bodies look great too gives many people an extra boost.

Many women with smaller breasts simply desire to know what it feels like to live with more ample cleavage. They want to be able to attract people who prefer bigger breasts or breasts that are younger looking and not sagging. They want that confidence that often comes with better cleavage. It’s common to hear about people in certain professions, such as acting or modeling, making surgical alterations to themselves to further their careers, but the need for confidence isn’t limited to people in entertainment. Women with business careers often feel a need to stand out to be competitive. Self-confidence is always an asset, professionally or socially.

When a woman decides to have breast augmentation, size of her breasts in the present and the future is a big part of her motivation. She has an idea in her mind of what she would like her improved breasts to look like. But is there a “right” sized breast for any one individual and how do you choose between a “B,” a “C,” or a “DD” implant? There are a number of factors that go into making that decision, but the volume of the implant itself is the least important of them.

In order to be comfortable and look right your breast implant must be sized to fit your chest, you breast envelope, and your goals. We’ll explain what these mean. It's not as simple as just picking a cup size. Additionally, creating a "wish list" of photos of other breasts are not predictive of your results. What your breasts look like now is the single largest influence on your result!

• Chest - The correct breast implant needs to match the patient’s overall figure. This is more difficult than it looks as there are a number of factors that affect breast appearance including height, ribcage and chest circumference, shoulder size, and current cup size.

Patients who have breast augmentation look forward to purchasing bras to showcase their new breasts, but they may not realize how important choosing the right bra is. This is especially true in the beginning, post-surgery, but also over time to make sure both that both the comfort with and appearance of the implants are maintained.

Immediately following surgery, Dr. Bancroft and Dr. Feldman provide their patients to with a surgical sports bra and specific instructions about wearing it following the procedure. This will help the breasts to heal and the breast implants to remain in the desired position. Patients should be sleeping on their backs for at least 12 weeks. Back sleeping is best for people with implants to prevent implant migration into their armpits. If, after the 12 week healing period, patients want to try sleeping in a side position, they should continue to wear the sports bra at night. We do not recommend stomach sleeping. This will cause the implants to move into the armpit region.

After the period of healing is complete, patients should wear normal supportive bras during the day. They should get sized before purchasing a bra in order to ensure that its is the right size and has the support necessary for the implants, and the new heavier breasts. Underwire bras are acceptable as long at they fit the implant/breast and do not “dig in.” We do not recommend any one brand or style, as everyone’s chest and ribs are different. Any brand should do as long as you get a “pop” or “push up” from the bra. This demonstrates that the bra is supporting the weight of the implant, instead of the skin.

Patients should not wear tight fitting or compressive sports bras without a defined cup or side support that just “smash” the breasts, either when sleeping or exercising. For people with natural breasts, this may work as the tighter the sports bra, the better it is, but for breasts that have implants, side and bottom support is essential. For someone with breast implants the goal of a sports bra is support pushing upwards and inwards to ensure the implants don’t move down or to the side over time. More support or compression is not always better as an extremely tight or poorly fitting bra especially when worn during the critical post-operative healing period (12 weeks), may prevent the breast implants from settling correctly, or deform the breast shape which might require further surgery to correct.

We recommend a sports bra withbuilt in cups, underwire or side panel that will contain and support the weight of the implant.  We find a sports bra similar to the VSX line at Victoria’s Secret that has a padded underwire to be very popular with our patients. We will provide your surgical bra with a front closure to make it easier to put on and off after surgery, but after 2 weeks you can switch to back closure if you prefer or they fit better.

Most people would agree that there is little that is more beautiful than a young mother with her first child. While pregnancy is not always enjoyable or pleasant, the hormonal changes to a woman’s body often give her a “glow” that is lovely to see, and when her child is placed in her arms to look at and to love, it’s a moment in a lifetime. Anyone is lucky to see it.

Those same hormonal changes that help to prepare a woman’s body for childbirth and nourish her baby both inside and outside the womb, alter her in ways women do not understand until they experience it for themselves. Skin and muscle ligaments soften, stretch, and sometimes even tear. Pregnancy is a dramatic and sometimes traumatic process, but nursing a baby is a taxing one too. After all of this, few women look or feel the same.

A “mommy makeover” is a combination of surgical procedures designed to restore a woman’s body as closely as possible to her pre-pregnancy state. The physical changes described above often result in loose skin, abdominal fat build up, and sagging breasts, particularly when a woman has gone through multiple pregnancies. Some women assume that when they’ve birthed and then weaned their last child, they can pull themselves into pre-baby shape with the right healthy food choices, exercise regimen, and body creams, but they do not understand that skin and muscle is not like a rubber band. It stretches, yes, but it doesn’t just bounce back with hard work and good intentions.

The mommy makeover involves both an abdominoplasty or tummy tuck (with potential liposuction to remove any stubborn abdominal fat) and a breast lift. The abdominoplasty procedure removes any sagging skin, stretch marks, and bulging and restores the tummy to its previous flat condition. Breasts lifts are used to tighten lax breast ligaments and help the breasts regain their previous “perky” look. Breast augmentation can also be done at the same time to add fullness.

Bancroft Feldman is pleased to offer its clientele a complete range of services with the goal of improving overall body appearance and returning a younger looking self, and very soon we will have another option for patients seeking a fuller, natural looking breast implant. In February the Food and Drug Administration approved Allergan, Inc.’s Natrelle INSPIRA™ smooth round gel breast implants for use by plastic surgeons and their patients.

This new option is a significant improvement particularly for women seeking a fuller breast look, including those who have already undergone surgery on their breasts and are interested in further revision surgery. The higher fill level of the INSPIRA™ option is ideal for women looking to replace the breast fullness they had pre-pregnancy or to upgrade an aging saline or silicone product. Of course, this is not the only Natrelle option available. There are over 200 size options and many projection styles within this specific product line, and Bancroft Feldman works with many others as well in order to provide their patients the most personally tailored options for their body style choices. We seek to satisfy both a desired look and exactly fit our patients’ body dimensions for the best overall breast augmentation experience, both short term and long term.

Who is the ideal patient for a breast implant? Women at least 22 years old for silicone filled implants and women who are at least 18 years old for saline-filled implants who seek breast augmentation either for aesthetic or medical reasons, as well as women who desire surgery to replace breast tissue lost either due to cancer treatment, trauma, or malformation. The ideal patient for the INSPIRA™ breast implant is the thin woman without tissue to hide a lesser filled implant or one with visible rippling now.

Are you a good candidate for a breast augmentation or a breast lift? Many women believe that the damage done to their bodies from normal life events like pregnancy, aging, or previous surgeries cannot be undone, but that is rarely the case. New medical advances and treatment options make having a beautiful body achievable and practical well beyond what used to be possible.

Bancroft Feldman is always looking for new ways to offer their patients better and safer choices for increasing satisfaction with their own bodies, which is why our surgeons are excited to have another breast augmentation option to include within their portfolio of surgical options. If Natrelle INSPIRA™ sounds like something that could help you achieve the fuller, more youthful breast look you’ve been dreaming of, contact us today. We would love to tell you more.