Fat transfer breast augmentation is growing in popularity as a natural alternative to breast implants. In a fat transfer procedure, fat cells are harvested using liposuction from a place on your body where the fat is not wanted — the waist, buttocks, or thighs — and injected into your breasts to increase their volume. Slimming the waist and abdomen while enhancing the breasts delivers the sought-after hour-glass figure.
Here are some of the reasons the procedure is seeing a surge of interest.
Women’s goals in breast enhancement are changing. Where big, round breasts were once desired, women today are seeking a more natural size, shape and feel. Fat transfer breast augmentation fits that need perfectly. Where implants can be used to add significant volume to the breasts, fat transfer is better suited to less dramatic enhancement, enlarging the breasts by a cup size at the most.
Even more significant is the natural feel of breasts augmented with fat transfer. Implants, skillfully placed, can certainly create natural-looking breasts. But breasts augmented with the body’s own fat tissue have both a natural look and a completely natural feel.
Though breast augmentation with implants has a reliable safety record, it does involve placing a foreign object in the body. More and more women are choosing fat transfer as a breast-enhancement alternative that uses the body’s own tissue.
Some women are also concerned about the lifespan of implants. Saline or silicone implants typically need to be removed or replaced after 10, 15 or 20 years, and sometimes sooner due to a change in position, rupture, or an immune reaction to the implant material (known as capsular contracture). With regular monitoring, there is little health risk from these issues, but they do require a second surgical procedure. With fat transfer, these issues are not concerns. For most patients, the injected fat stays in place indefinitely.
If you plan to have children, breast augmentation with fat transfer is a lower-risk option than implants. Implant rupture and immune reaction can interfere with milk production or require a second breast surgery at a time that makes it impossible to breastfeed.
A fat transfer procedure involves tiny incisions, no more than a quarter of an inch, both where the fat is harvested and where it is injected into the breasts. That compares with incisions of one to two inches in the breast for implants. The small incisions used in fat transfers typically heal completely, with no visible scarring. The longer incisions required for implants almost always leave visible scars, though the effect is minimized by the incision locations — either in the fold line under the breast or around the border of the nipple.
Fat transfer offers two benefits in a single procedure. At the same time your breasts are augmented, unwanted fat in your belly, buttocks, or thighs is removed. You get fuller, natural-looking breasts and a tighter waist or slimmer thighs at the same time. What’s not to like about that?
Find out if fat transfer breast enhancement is right for you. Contact our office in Long Beach, CA, today at (562) 448-6100 to ask your questions schedule a personal consultation with Dr. Waltzman.
