Ladies, some advice please -
Has anyone had lipofill (to even up lopsided boobs) to a breast that has had radiotherapy? After bilateral WLE and bilateral radiotherapy, I now have Droopy and Perky, and Perky could now apparently have a bit of lipofill to match up with Droopy.
I’d be really grateful if anyone who has had this done could tell me what it was like/how successful it is.
Thanks a lot
grumpy
Hi Grumpy, I haven’t but it was offered… the nice man said ‘we can make that one bigger or the other one smaller’! I am now on a very slow moving NHS waiting list* for a reduction to my droopy equivalent. There is a poster called Cheshire Cheese who has just had lipo (as it happens by the PS who did my recon, not the ‘nice man’ above) on both sides, so she may be able to comment?
* To be fair, the uptake on recons here is three times the national average (two female PS who really champion immediate recon where possible) so inevitably the non-urgent procedures have longer wait times.
If you put “lipofill” into the advanced search you’ll find all posts on the subject. x
Hi Grumpy
As RevCat said, I’ve just had lipo on both sides. I’ve had the conventional type on the non-BC side and stem cell enriched lipofill on the BC side. It’s far too early to tell if mine will be successful or not - success meaning that the fat grafts and doesn’t disappear.
Lots of people seem to have lipofill done on a breast that has had rads, but then find that it doesn’t “take”, i.e. the injected fat gets re-absorbed. Some women on here have had it done 2 or 3 times but each time it’s all disappeared.
Having done a lot of reading around on the subject there seems to be a prevailing school of thought that this is what will always happen on the breast that has had rads, because the blood supply has been permanently damaged by the rads.
I saw one PS who was quite dismissive of lipofill on the grounds that it wouldn’t work on the rads side, and isn’t recommended on the healthy side because of the risk of it causing micro-calcifications and therefore false cancer alerts later on.
I then saw a 2nd PS, who said she could do the lipofill, but recommended the stem cell enriched type on the rads treated side, to overcome the blood supply problem. She said that conventional lipofill would be fine on the healthy side, they know that about 30% will be reabsorbed, so they overfill by that much to allow for it.
Time will tell which PS was right!
Hi Grumpy,
Just saw my surgeon this morning. I am having lipofill to a WLE and rads treated breast. I asked him about conventional versus stem-cell enriched and said should I not be having conventional on a rads treated breast, He said he can’t see why it would make any difference to how well it takes, has been using conventional for several years privately with very good results (although only on NHS for last 6 months) and that conventional is used all over the country and mainly for breast cancer reconstruction - so mainly on rads treated breasts.
While I am sure stemcell enriched is probably an improved version - it sounds like the gold standard treatment - my BS who is very good and senior has no qualms about me having lipofill after rads and says many women who he has seen would benefit from it and now they are working through a list of people who expressed and interest previously. It seems to be an area where opinions vary. I am fairly optimistic - as rads didn’t have too great an effect on me, didn’t cause shrinkage or even much burning - that all may be well.
He has, though, warned it may take 2 or 3 goes and estimates the percentage of re-absorbtion of fat to be 30% although he says it is variable person to person, depends on where the fat is taken from. I was told that thigh fat reabsorbs less than stomach fat!
Of course there are no guarantees but while there will be bruising, it is only a day surgery so I thought I would give at least the first one a go! I mentioned the lumps after lipofill and was told that radiographers can tell the difference so not to worry xx
I think it’s yet another of those situations where the surgeons who don’t get good results with lipofill claim that it’s not possible to get good results, whereas the more competent ones DO get good results. The number of repeat fills needed seems to vary a great deal from one surgeon to another.
At least I have plenty more fat left over for further transfers if needed!
@chesirecheese I think I fall into the first category, 3 ops, no visible improvement, had no bruising after or any noticeable size increase. Great news it worked for you!
Tina, isn’t it odd how it can vary so much. I would have thought it would be a dead cert that there would be bruising and an initial improvement even if the fat reabsorbs. Hope I see some kind of improvement to make it worth another general anaesthetic…
Hi Tina46
It’s far too early for me to say yet if mine has worked or not - it was only done last Monday (26th March). It will be at least another 3 months or so before it will become clear if the fat has stayed put or not.
Having said that the PS who did the work warned me in advance that I was likely to need two goes on the rads side and one on the non-rads side, which is fewer than most seem to need.
How I wish I had a crystal ball!
Ladies
thank you all for your comments - I feel much cheerier now!!!
grumpy