US News and World report has an article regarding teens at the age of 18 getting plastic surgery.  This is something that we have all heard before and in some cases, this has been deadly!

The article states  ‘Several factors are important in deciding when and for whom surgery is appropriate: an ability to understand the procedure; that the desire for surgery does not reflect what a parent, friend, or boyfriend desires; and that expectations are realistic’. 

‘If your expectations aren’t realistic and you have low self-esteem or no friends, cosmetic surgery is not the right answer. Rather, I would recommend counseling’.

Personally I think this is good advice for all women no matter what age.  Many women have low self esteem and decide to go under the knife to enhance body parts that they don’t feel comfortable with.  They are also made to believe that what they are doing is safe.    

The article also mentions the FDA guidelines that teens under 22 can only be implanted with saline implants and must be 22 if they want silicone gel.  Something the FDA has decided on that really never made sense to me.  Will 4 years really make a difference???  I doubt not.  Implants do not know your age!  If you are going to have complications, they will happen whether you are 18 or 35 and we have seen that women become ill from both saline implants and silicone gel. 

I would like to add as well that I was 35 when I decided on breast augmentation.  Yes, I had low self esteem and did this because I felt too thin.  I also did my ‘homework’ and found nothing indicating that saline implants were dangerous to your health.  I have since learned that this is not the case at all.  I think the best thing for me would have been counseling and going to the gym to build up those area’s of my body I didn’t feel comfortable with.  No, this would not have increased my breast size but it certainly would have made me feel better about myself.  I think about that often and wondered why no one ever suggested that to me.  Maybe this is what these teens should be doing instead of lipo at age 18.  Really, we need to concentrate more on eating healthy and exercise.  I bet most teens and adults would not need lipo if they changed their diet and excercised on a regular basis. 

It would be nice if parents encouraged their teens to eat healthy and exercise on a regular basis and I don’t mean to a point that it becomes obsessive as this can be a problem as well.  I think that 18 is just too young to be thinking about enhancing your body using cosmetic surgery to achive that.  Also, these parents should also be educated on the dangers and lets not forget to reassure our teens that the body God has given them is perfect and does not need altering in any way.  This will all lead to a healthy outlook in the future and acceptance of their bodies. 

Lastly, I do believe this article makes some good points regarding plastic surgery and teens, I just don’t agree with all of it. 

 Beth

Cosmetic Surgery Today posted a blog today entitled “Safety of Breast Implants Spark Fiery Debate“.  They mentioned a Beauty and the Breast post, which acknowledged that women are often “sold” on the idea of breast implants after visiting a plastic surgeon.  Although I’m thrilled that they are giving attention to the negative side of breast augmentation and asking women to thoroughly research the procedure, I’m not pleased with the site that they linked for research. 

I thought that everyone deserves  to know that there is an independent informational site that is dedicated to truly informing consumers.  It’s not sponsored by plastic surgeons or manufacturers, rather it is a product of a non-profit think tank that is dedicated to analyzing existing research.  If a person wants to know science-based information regarding breast augmentation, then www.breastimplantinfo.org is the place to visit.  If you haven’t checked it out yet, it’s a must read for women, doctors, and the media.

~Kacey

I was absolutely delighted to see this blog published in the OC Register today. The blog was written by Colin Stewart and is called “Breast Implants are like cell phones – much loved, but a problem.” Colin starts off his blog by pointing another interesting blog, which was written in the Freakonomics section of the NY Times on June 18th. He points out that it wasn’t so much the blog itself that was interesting, but the barrage of comments that came after the blog was published that struck everyone’s interest! Women were coming out of the “woodworks” to share their thoughts about breast implants, including their major life-altering health problems stemming from breast implants. I’m sure that the NY Times and Dr. Zenn (the plastic surgeon that was interviewed for the NY Times blog) had no idea what was to come after this blog was published. Women attacked Dr.Zenn’s comment on the safety level of breast implants. The author of the NY Times blog asked Dr. Zenn which implant is safer, silicone or saline, and if all of the concerns surrounding breast implants were all hoopla. Dr. Zenn answered that silicone and saline implant have the same level of safety, and that yes the concerns are all hoopla. Women who have actually had/have breast implants implanted into their bodies had quite the difference in opinion!

Colin then goes on to wittily point out the similarity in cell phones and breast implants. He points out that both are embraced by enthusiastic consumers who are willing to overlook the problems they cause. Colin says “With cell phones, the problems tend to be dropped calls and inaudible conversations. With breast implants, the problems range from minor flaws in breast appearance to major health crises that require medical intervention.”

Last year alone, 30,000 women removed their Breast Implants. To me, THAT alone is reason to be concerned over a “medical device.” There is a reason that these women removed their implants. I’d like to know when the medical community (independent from plastic surgeons and implant manufacturers) is going to start studying WHY so many women are removing their implants. I’d also like to see some long-term, independent studies on what the true health concerns are with breast implants. There are too many women who are having problems and serious health concerns. This issue simply cannot be over-looked, pushed aside and ignored any longer. Women deserve to know the truth. We deserve to know exactly what we are getting ourselves into when we choose to enlarge our breasts with silicone. 

Beauty and The Breast would like to thank Colin Stewart for giving both sides to this very controversial issue. All too many times, publications, websites and articles only share the opinions and beliefs of the plastic surgery community, and never bother sharing the opinions of the women who have been harmed by breast implants.

“I am a research engineer that works primarily with materials. PVC is used because it is the cheapest durable plastic, and its properties can be customized with additives. Not only is PVC harmful, the additives are harmful too (if not worse). For women and mothers everywhere, pay close attention to the use of PVC in anything that touches you or your child, especially when it comes to baby’s toys and sex toys. Visit wikipedia for a very thorough discussion on this plastic.”  ~Mr. Engineer

Mr. Engineer,  

Thank you for your comments. I thought your insightful post needed to be the focus of our next discussion.  I seemingly meet people with priviledged information all of the time. While vacationing one year, I met a researcher who had found a connection between hair dye and cancer. When their research was really starting to make strides, she said the FDA came in, collected everything, and said they’ll be taking over the study…and then she never heard anything more of it. She said that this was typical when researchers find something that could cause a lot of concern and the FDA gets wind of it. By the way, from what she said, it might be a good idea to avoid every color but brown.

Another time, a doctor of mine mentioned that during his residency, he was helping with a study on artificial sweeteners and their effect on rats. He said that every one of the rats got cancer during the study, and that they were instructed to surgically remove the cancer, and then the rats were considered “cancer-free”. Nevermind that they all got cancer from the sweeteners, with the cancer removed they could pretend it never happened. ***Did you know that in breast implant studies, often times the women that remove their implants (for whatever reason) are automatically dropped from from the study altogether?  Now I’m sure the public would be curious to know WHY they removed their implants (personal choice, health problems, capsular contracture, rupture, etc.).  That’s information that would be HELPFUL to a study, I would think.

These are just examples of a small amount of the information I’ve been exposed to by the professionals that have been involved with research. I wish we could all know what is really going on, from the people who see it happening every day. The best tool we have in this day and age is the Internet, as free-speech can truly prevail and companies are not able to stop our messages (or at least for the most part).

Thanks again for giving us a heads up. I encourage others to do the same, as we should all help each other to be as safe and healthy as possible. You’d think the FDA was looking out for us (they can barely keep up with produce by the way), but that’s just something we tell ourselves at night to help us sleep better.

Any other things we should look out for, readers?

~Kacey

I must ask myself why this country is so hell bent on ignoring the fact that breast implants are NOT safe.  How could they be when there is a list as long as my leg containing all the toxic chemicals they contain.

Okay, good so this country is very concerned that while taking a shower, we might be exposed to toxins as I learned when I read this article.  But wait a minute…..breast implants contain this chemical as well.  So does this mean that its okay to insert this into our bodies but oh, please, don’t take a shower????? 

I continued to read the article and they even mention mold being a problem in the shower!  We know that implants, you know the saline ones that are supposed to have that sterile saline in them?  We know that they can and do grow mold. 

I must ask WHY if shower curtains are being modified so they do not contain this chemical, why is it that the Breast Implant Manufacturers continue to make these toxic devices and PS’s insert them into a woman’s body (don’t forget they are FDA approved!).  They continue to claim these devices are safe!  Could it be that you can purchase a shower curtain for a buck at your local dollar store and breast implants cost thousands and thousands of dollars over the long term???   Just like the long list of chemicals, one being polyvinyl chloride, there is a long list of companies making money from these implants. 

These ‘Shower Curtain Companies’ have already started making the curtains so that they don’t contain this chemical but what is the plan for breast implants???

Please be careful the next time you take a shower.  It could be dangerous to your health between the PVC and mold.  So I guess we would be safe to say taking a shower with a shower curtain made from PVC that has mold on it and having saline implants that are growing mold in them is really hazardous to your health.

~Beth

I just wanted you all to know the Senator’s snail mail address. We recently found out (thanks Pam S.) that her E-mail will respond to to CA. residents. It’s so important to thank her for supporting us with this Bill. If you are not a California constituent, PLEASE mail her a note with thanks. Sybil and I will be there soon and it would be great if we could hear from her that there was a response. Here is her address. I will try to get back to you soon with another link. Please send this out to your groups as well. Thanks,
Mary

Honorable Barbara Boxer

United States Senate

Hart Senate Building, Room 112

Washington, D.C. 20510

Hello All,

I just to let you know the following article was posted in the “FDA Week” section of InsideHealthPolicy.com website. Too bad about the “oversight”!!!!

BOXER BILL REQUIRES TERMS OF DEVICE POST-MARKET STUDIES TO BE PUBLIC

_______________________________________________

Date: May 23, 2008

Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) introduced a bill May 15 that would require FDA to publish the terms of post-market medical device commitments and any changes made to them.

S 3020, the FDA Accountability and Transparency Act, reacts to problems that advocates for women injured by silicone breast implants have had in following the status of post-market studies for those products. But the legislation would apply to all implanted device post-market studies.

FDA often asks that manufacturers of implanted devices study their products once on the market. When FDA conditionally approved silicone breast implants in 2006, it required the two manufacturers of the implants, Mentor and Allergan, to conduct post-market studies on 40,000 women over 10 years.

Under the agreement, it was mandatory for woman receiving the implants to participate in the study. But when advocates met with FDA officials on the studies, officials said the companies were having a difficult time enrolling patients in the studies because FDA had dropped the mandatory participation at the companies’ request, according to Chris Revere of the Sheridan Group.

Revere said the changes to the study commitments pose a public health problem because women were not notified that the safety studies were slowed. When asked why FDA had not notified the public, Revere said FDA officials responded that they were not required to.

“Before the ink dries on these agreements, they’re in there trying to change the terms,” Revere said of device companies.

Boxer’s bill would require that FDA publish post-market study terms, or changes to them, in the Federal Register.

The bill also would increase the amount that FDA may fine companies that shirk their commitments. Revere said penalties available for drug companies currently are far higher than those for device makers, and the bill would bring parity.

The Advanced Medical Technology Association did not respond.

A clerical error in the FDA Amendments Act exempts device makers from having to report clinical trial adverse events to the online database established by the same law. The database serves as a listing of registry information for drug and device clinical trials, as well as their results. Adverse events from device trials do not have to be reported to the results database due to a wording oversight.

The House last year passed a corrections bill adding devices to the adverse events reporting requirement, but the bill never passed the Senate.

I’m so pleased to tell you that we have a great champion in United States Senator Barbara Boxer of California, who late last week introduced a bill (S.3020) to bring greater accountability and transparency to the FDA’s regulation of silicone breast implants and all medical devices.

When the FDA approved the use of silicone implants in 2006, it failed to live up to its mandate of ensuring that the product was safe before allowing it to go on the market. Instead, the FDA decided to allow manufactures to conduct post-approval studies to demonstrate the safety of the implants once they were implanted. However, in a matter of a few months, the manufacturers convinced FDA to change the requirements of the studies, without any public input. And we learned that the FDA was essentially a “toothless tiger” when it came to going after medical device manufacturers who drag their feet or fail to submit data from their studies. Mary and I set out to correct these injustices by approaching Congress with our findings and Senator Boxer responded.

S.3020 prevents FDA from unilaterally and secretly waiving or altering a post-approval agreement with a manufacturer, without letting the public know. The bill also gives FDA greater authority to force manufacturers to comply with their post-marketing agreements, by increasing fines and requiring public notification that could lead to the removal of the product from the market.

Please send Senator Boxer a note of thanks for introducing this vital and necessary legislation. The medical device manufacturers are a $75 billion industry with a lot of influence in Washington, D.C., so it’s very important that Senator Boxer know we support her.

The easiest and most effective way is to visit her website and simply fill in the email form. Under the heading of “message topic” choose “Women’s issues” and under the heading of “Message Subject” type in “S.3020 FDA Accountability and Transparency Act.”

In the message box, please thank the Senator for introducing the bill. Her bill is vital to making sure FDA and the public receive all information necessary to make an informed decision about whether or not medical devices are safe. And let her know that FDA needs more enforcement authority to punish device makers who delay or fail to disclose information.

Please alert your networks, family and friends. Encourage them to express their support for the bill and to thank Senator Boxer.

Mary and I will be in Washington, D.C. next month and we’d love to hear the Senator tell us about all the emails she received from in support of the bill!

When I made the decision to get breast implants, I thought it was a personal one. I thought it was a choice I could make on my own because I was the only person the surgery would affect. I could never have known that the decision I made at 19, would negatively impact the life of my mother, my father, and all of my siblings, friends, and future husband. Who would have thought???

Tomorrow is Mother’s Day and it started me thinking about everything that my mom has done for me over the years. When I was a baby and couldn’t take care of myself, she was there. Slowly she taught me how to care for myself and others, and helped me to pursue my dreams. When it was time for college, I thought I had reached a new place in my relationship with my mother. The old times of her taking care of my physical needs had completely passed and I was to be independent from now on. The next time someone would need help physcially should have been my mother, when she’s around 80. Imagine my complete shock when just 2 years after leaving home, I was back and needing more physical help than I ever could have dreamed possible.

My mom was against the idea of my getting breast implants. She thought it was rediculous and completely out of character for me, but I was 19, and she knew I would make my own decision. After a few months of getting my implants, I started experiencing sharp pains in my arms that would come and go. I mentioned this to my mother, and she immediately thought the implants could be to blame. I remember getting angry that she would even consider it because I knew it couldn’t be possible. I had the procedure done by an excellent plastic surgeon and I was naive enough to think that nothing bad could happen because the FDA gave the saline breast implants their stamp of approval. 100% safe, at least in my mind anyway.

Slowly I began seeing things her way. Symptom after new symptom appeared. Doctor after doctor told us that implants were safe, and they would try their hand at a pill or something else they thought was sure to stop my joint pain. Nothing helped and I got to the point where my joints, bones, and muscles were on fire and I could barely get out of bed.

Thankfully, I graduated college, as it was a life-long dream of mine, and with a diploma, I knew I could die happy. And that’s just what I saw in my future…nothing….I didn’t think I’d make it long enough to have one. My mom stayed by my side the entire time, making sure I had bites of food small enough to try and chew, rubbing “old people” lotion all over my muscles and joints so I could get up and take a shower, and talking with me because that’s about all I was still capable of at the time. I wouldn’t leave the house for weeks because it hurt too badly to walk. Today I was thinking about the times when I did have a little energy to spare and I would ask to tag along when my mom needed to go grocery shopping. You wouldn’t think this is much, but it took me so long to walk a step or two, I know I slowed her down immensely. She never talked about what an inconvenience my bi-weekly or more doctors appointments were, or that she had 7 other children (all younger than myself) that needed her. What’s even more, she never made me feel bad about choosing to get the breast implants that she didn’t want for me, and that ended up almost killing me and making me such an extra burden on my family.  My mom wished someone would have told us of the dangers of breast implants, and so she encouraged me when I was given the opportunity to share my story through an MTV documentary.  She accompanied me on many flights to New York and took care of me so that I could share my story with the world.  Without her, I would not have been able to do any of this.

 After having my implants removed, I started feeling better immediately.  My joint and muscle pain lessened about 40% just with the explant surgery alone!  I started trying things that would get tiny remnants of silicone out of my body (the shell from the implants) and slowly got better.  I finally found a rheumatologist that was human, and she talked me through Rheumatoid Arthritis and found the right drugs to stop my joint damage (at the time I could not move one of my arms to my head, I could barely walk because of foot pain, etc.).  And now 4 years after having my implants removed and giving myself injections and chemo once a week, my RA is officially in remission.  This means that my blood tests are perfectly normal and that my body is not currently attacking itself and causing inflammation.  I was so excited to call my mom and tell her the good news a few weeks ago.  I tell her how much better I feel, but now she can see concrete proof that I’ll be okay.

 So you see, breast implants ended up affecting my life and the life of everyone that loved me, then and in the years to come.  I never thought I’d end up with Rheumatoid Arthritis, a disease that is always with you and can rear it’s ugly head at any time.  I have permanent joint damage as the disease hit me so quickly and help didn’t arrive in time.  I never thought I’d have to move back in with my parents or become disabled at the age of 20.  I never thought that my entire life might be focused around getting and keeping medical insurance so I can pay for the very medicines that may end up giving me horrible side effects in the future.  I was 19 and I just decided to get breast implants.  

Happy Mother’s Day, Mom.  Thanks for hanging in there.

 ~Kacey

“My friends have done it and rave about it.”

“My friends look great, and it looks so easy.”

“Everyone is doing it, so it MUST BE SAFE.”

“I’m going to get it done too…”

This is the thinking process for so many people when it comes to cosmetic surgery. It leaves a lot of room for terrible things to happen. Case in point is Priscilla Presley, who ended up with with industrial-grade silicone in her face.

Priscilla, like so many of her social set, was taken in by Daniel Serrano, a handsome Argentinian who had somehow plugged into the Hollywood elite. Serrano, who turns out wasn’t even licensed to practice medicine in the US, provided what he claimed were miracle injections that worked better than Botox. According to TMZ,

Serrano was injecting industrial, low-grade silicone similar to what’s used to lubricate auto parts in Argentina into the faces of these women. Several women, including Shawn King, Larry’s wife, and Diane Richie, Lionel’s wife at the time, held injection parties in their homes, with Serrano needling them with the non-FDA approved drug that he had smuggled in to the U.S. He charged between $300 and $500 a pop.

The injections caused lumps, paralysis and even holes in the face. Serrano, subsequently dubbed “Dr. Jiffy Lube,” ended up in jail, but not before disfiguring many women.

What this story perfectly illustrates is how a herd mentality can take over when a cosmetic medical procedure that can have very serious side effects loses its social stigma. It can become widespread, and finally “fashionable and trendy.” I feel so much sympathy for Priscilla – it’s so hard to exercise your own judgment when the people around you and your social environment urge you to rush in. Under this kind of pressure, any thought of caution and due diligence very easily falls to the wayside.

That’s why the FDA’s decision to put silicone breast implants back on the market, charging women with informed consent, is such a crime. These days, if it were possible to have house parties for breast implants, believe me, they would be happening! In such an atmosphere, how many women, like Serrano’s poor victims, are falling into the herd mentality and consenting to this surgery with only their friends’ or doctors’ safety assurances? Too many, I’m afraid.