Will The Asymmetry After Getting Breast Implants With A Lift Improve As I Heal?

Q:I had a combined breast augmentation with a lift about 3 weeks ago. It seems like my implant on the left side is below my breast. It has been like that from the beginning so I should have asked the doctor aboutthat when I last saw him. I was just wondering if it is like that because of swelling still or is it going to stay like that. I know it has only been 3 weeks and my doctor said you really can’t critique it for 3 months, so I’m not overly concerned just wondering about it. Maybe my left one required more work, it’s still a little bruised. I didn’t know if I should try to do something to push it up? I guess I was wondering if this is normal. I probably wouldn’t think as much about it if both of my breasts did the same thing. I have attached some pictures for you to see.

A: Based on the pictures, the left breast implant is below your original inframmary fold of which some of that crease still exists. It is often necessary to lower an inframammary crease, particularly in cases where there is breast asymmetry. I would suspect that your original left breast was smaller with a higher imframammary fold prior to surgery. This made it necessary to achieve better symmetry during surgery by lowering the crease on that side so the implant will match better with the original larger right breast. This is an issue in which more time is going to be needed to see how the whole breast shapes out over time. Combined breast augmentation with lifts are always more complicated than when implants are placed alone, particularly when there is significant prior differences between the the breast mounds and the level of the inframammary folds. I think it would be alright now to begin wearing an underwire to give that left breast better support as healing progresses.

Dr. Barry Eppley

Indianapolis, Indiana