Assets: Beauty and the Implanted Breast - Asset or disaster? By Richard Chang
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Beauty is more than skin deep these days. With surgical implants, women -- and increasingly, men -- seek to enhance their physical assets, with inserts as big as breasts or as small as say, a Viagra bottle.
Image-hungry consumers are remodeling their bodies in droves now that cosmetic surgery is relatively affordable and painless -- or so it seems, anyway. For $3,000 to $5,000, excluding hospital and other related expenses, you can get quick boosts to your bustline, chest, chin, cheeks, calves -- and sexual prowess, of course.
Choosing a new chin or breasts is almost as easy as picking a hair color. Browse through a catalogue at your plastic surgeon's office. If they're not quite right, just have them custom made. Silicone, with a texture like the famous Gumby doll, is the choice material, especially since studies to determine its link to cancer and autoimmune diseases have not been conclusive. But never mind safety questions. Business is booming.
``Implants are here to stay. Women want them,'' said Wendy Lewis, an independent plastic surgery and beauty consultant in New York (http://www.wlbeauty.com). ``In the U.K., it's the No. 1 procedure. In the U.S., it's No. 2 next to liposuction.'' In the United States, more than 132,000 women boosted their bustlines with saline- or silicone-filled sacs in 1998, according to the latest data from the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (http://www.plasticsurgery.org). In 1992, just 32,000 women underwent this procedure.
Chin implants are a distant second in popularity, followed by enhancements of cheeks and buttocks. Figures are not available for pectoral and penile implants for men, or calves for both sexes, though surgeons and consultants say demand is growing.
``There's a tremendous benefit'' from having implants, said Dr. Lu Jean Fang who, having operated on thousands of women over 26 years, is very aware of implant dangers as well. ``It makes the breasts beautiful and sexy, but people need to know the potential risks. If the pleasure they get outweighs their sense of risk, it's a good thing to do because it will make them feel good about themselves, just like a face-lift ''
Nicole Cummings, a 31-year-old mother, grew up with uneven breasts after she had a tumor removed in her teen-age years. Implants finally helped restore her self-esteem, prompting her to create a Web site that has grown -- with sponsorship from plastic surgeons -- into the largest chat room and clearinghouse for information about the procedure (http://www.implantinfo.com). ``It changed my life in a way I can't even express,'' Cummings said. ``I felt really deformed. Now I feel complete. It's reflected in everything I do.''
She bristles at talk that breast enlargement is for glamorpusses. ``Most women with implants are in their late 20s and 30s, who are just not satisfied with the way they look anymore'' because of the effects of pregnancy or aging, she said. ``This is my life, my choice. Let me take charge of my life.''
But countless women claim that their implants triggered life-threatening autoimmune diseases that are too high a price to pay for beauty. Manufacturers and surgeons choose to ignore or downplay these risks out of greed, they say.``There's been a huge cover-up with the dangers. God knows there aren't supposed to be foreign objects in the body,'' said Ilena Rosenthal, director of the Humantics Foundation for Women, a major anti-implant support group (http://www.info-implants.com, http://www.toxic-exposure.com).
Unlike say, a face-lift, breast implant surgery leaves a piece of material in your body that nature regards as an ''invader'' and tries to fight. While many women have no problems with their implants for years, often the surrounding tissue hardens as the autoimmune system forms a thick scar capsule to protect the body from harm. Cancer and other diseases may be a side effect, although the evidence is not conclusive.
Chin, cheek, buttocks, pecs and calf implants are solid and usually stay in place. But breast implants are more liable to move, as they are filled with silicone gel, saline solution or soy oil that may leak.While manufacturers and plastic surgeons stress the safety of implants, British health officials in May warned that women should remove soy implants because the oil can become toxic over time. Inamend Corp., the Santa Barbara, Calif.-based manufacturer, said it has set aside $100 million to cover costs related to the Trilucent implants, which affects 5,000 women in the United Kingdom, 165 in the United States and 20 in Canada.
Also, a recent study by the Food and Drug Administration using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), showed that 69 percent of women who had their first implants before 1988 had at least one rupture. One-third of another group of women studied had at least one surgery to have an implant removed or replaced.
``This is the information that manufacturers know but they don't want the public to know,'' said Dr. Feng, whose own study confirmed the FDA's findings. ``Many patients are hurt by implants,'' she said. ``For some people the benefits outweigh the risks. They have to make their own personal decision.''
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