Breast Implants Cause Chronic Fatigue & Inflammation!? The CATASTROPHIC Symptoms of Breast Implant Illness (BII) + Holistic Strategies to Make a *Full* Recovery!

My name is Ben Greenfield, and on this episode of the Ben Greenfield Life podcast.

I took out her implants, checked them on the back table, and they were just covered in biofilm. So, for everybody listening, biofilm makes it so your body can't attack it in and kill it. And it switches on your immune system. And the longer these folks go and they get adrenal fatigue, they get chronic inflammatory symptoms, they get gut dysfunction, they get brain fog, they get, you know, arrhythmias, they get shortness of breath. Like, every system becomes affected.

Fitness, nutrition, biohacking, longevity, life optimization, spirituality, and a whole lot more.

Welcome to the Ben Greenfield Life Show. Are you ready to hack your life? Let's do this.

Welcome to a very special episode of the Ben Greenfield Life Show recorded at Elevation of the beautiful Sundance Resort. Outside of Salt Lake City while sipping, at least in my case, mezcal. It appears my guest also mezcal here. Cheers. We'll drink it for the audience. And it can get dangerous drinking at altitudes. This podcast could go south pretty fast. Now, you have not heard of my guest before, at least not on my show. I'm going to have him explain to you a little bit more about what he does. His name is Dr. Robert Whitfield. And here's the deal, all the shownotes for today's show you can find at BenGreenfieldLife.com/implants, BenGreenfieldLife.com/implants, which may give you a little bit of a clue as far as the topic of today's show because Rob has been a plastic surgeon for over 25 years, board-certified for over 16 years, specializes in something called breast implant removal surgery. This is not a topic that I've addressed on the show before. So, Robert, this is going to be super interesting. I'm really actually honored to get the word out about this. You want to read Rob's full bio, his history, extensive history as a surgeon, I'll link to it again at BenGreenfieldLife.com/implants. But probably, we should cut to the most important thing first here, Robert. And, you were telling me just as we were eating dinner, in the conference room right before we stepped out here that there are 3 rules. I think you said there are 3 rules of a good surgeon. Alright, do tell.

Eat when you can, sleep when you can, and don't fuck with the pancreas.

Eat when you can. I get that. Sleep when you can. And I get the eat when you can, by the way, because I grew up with 2 brothers. That's right. Sleep when you can and don't fuck with the pancreas. Is that the last one? The last one baffles me.

Traditional surgery training. Pancreas is a very unforgiving organ. You have to be very respectful of it when you operate on it. And my traditional training in surgery was by people who operate on it, were very skilled at it. So, first of all, thank you for having me on the show. I've followed you for a long period of time now. I'm very interested in biohacking. We're here at Veggie50, obviously. Yeah. And I love your type of audience. So, the people who follow you are very engaged in their own personal mission on health. And those are the easier patients for me to care for. So, I really appreciate that, and you're on.

Ben Greenfield: Yeah. Well, I'm honored to have you on. And by the way, you did mention Da Vinci 50. For those who don't know what that is, it's a private collective of people who are kind of on the frontiers of health, age reversal, longevity, physicians, scientists, researchers, acts like me, et cetera. And, we all gather in a location a few times a year to kind of ferment in each other's wisdom and in some cases foolishness. So anyways, I actually, when you and I first started talking maybe 6 months ago, Robert, I really didn't realize that breasts, how do you say it, breast implant illness? Breast implant illness was even that big of a deal. I suspected maybe some women were getting microplastics in their system or something like that. But, from what I understand, it goes way beyond that. Right.

So, for your audience, about 2.2 million implants are placed worldwide annually.

It's a lot of boobs.

In our country alone, 360,000 annually. So, in 2016, I had a patient come to me after a very long period of time of having a breast reconstruction. And, by way of history, I'm an oncologic reconstructive plastic surgeon. So, I did head and neck cancer reconstruction, sarcoma reconstruction, and of course, breast cancer reconstruction, the most prevalent cancer we would see. And so, this patient came to me and wanted their breast reconstruction removed. They wanted to go flat. You have that from a few times a year in patients. Everything otherwise was normal on the patient. Her main complaint was fatigue. Kind of like chronic fatigue. And many patients who have chemotherapy have and suffer from bone marrow suppression, and so they have chronic fatigue, right? So her other indices, laboratory analysis in basic allopathic labs were all normal. Blood work was all normal. Scans were all normal. I did her case. She only asked one thing, that I make sure and take out all the material, the capsule material. For the audience, that's the scar that forms around a breast implant or hip implant or knee implant or a gallbladder. Your body's response to that is scar, to make scar. And so, of course, I would always take these out as part of the oncologic process when I remove these tissues, implants, and we send them off to look for bacteria, fungi. We send off the material to look for recurrent cancer, of course.

And when you're or when you were doing implants like this, Were these primarily people who had gotten the implants for aesthetic reasons or people who had gotten them post-chemo or post-breast removal? Yeah.

In my career, it's for breast cancer.

Okay.

Predominantly, it was breast cancer reconstruction. So, much like this patient, she sought me out for my expertise in breast cancer reconstruction. Okay.

Okay, got you. So, what did you find?

So, interestingly on her it's most important that there's no evidence of recurrent cancer, right? Predominantly, my sister passed away in January after a long bout with cancer. But the most important thing anytime taking care of breast cancer survivors, make sure they don't have recurrent disease as we heard from Dr. Azra today. But she had E. coli infection, which it's hard to fathom how someone can wander around year over year with an E. coli infection. This was locked onto the implant in, we'll just call it a biofilm. So, biofilm for the audience is a collection of, in this instance, we'll say bacteria that get stuck on the surface of the device and form a colony.

This would be the same type of biofilm that you'll find in people's guts who have mold, fungal overgrowth, et cetera.

Correct. And, this is the big idea with this problem. So, I was like, man, I missed this. If somebody had missed this on my sister, I'd be incredibly pissed off. So, I went back for all of my notes and everything and the scans and I was like, how did I miss this? And the short answer is we just didn't know. Sophisticated as we are, we did not know about this. And she put me on a social media platform and I just had patients start coming out of the woodwork wanting their implants taken out. So, my office is getting calls and they're like, "Why are these people calling to get the breast implants removed?" So now, it's a mixture of patients.

It's— Because, by the way, you think that women would want to retain those implants for aesthetic purposes.

Right.

But what you're implying is that there's something going on that overrides their desire for the aesthetic appearance of breasts because there's some underlying issue that those breasts have caused.

And, at this point, this I did not understand. I had never heard of this. And, all of a sudden now, I'm thrust into this situation where patients are coming in complaining of brain fog and fatigue and chronic inflammatory disease type symptoms.

And, I'm like, "Huh, I don't know." But, it's not because they still have cancer.

No. Now, these are a mixture of patients. These are cosmetic patients.

Okay. So, cosmetic patients now as well, not cancer patients. Yeah.

And, I'm like you, I'm like, What the hell is going on here? And so, because this patient had infection, you know, your collection of experiences, and as a physician, you have a collection of experiences to draw on. I thought, well, if this person has come to the conclusion that they don't want their reconstruction or their cosmetically placed implants, that's their decision. And it's not my position to dissuade them. It's just to inform them about the surgical risks, benefits, and they make their own decision. That's, that's part of being, uh, involved in patient care and making informed decisions. So I started doing these. And so I would do them, you know, here and there, a few months, then it became a few a week. And this kind of grew.

Where's your practice, by the way?

In Austin, Texas.

Okay.

So, in 2018, I had a nurse travel and she came from New Orleans. Her sister lived in Austin. And, I took out her implants, checked them on the back table, and they were just covered in biofilm at that point.

So, when you take out the implants, you can set them on the table and literally see what's on them?

Yeah. So, this one in particular was really slimy.

How do you take them out? Are you just making an incision and pulling them out?

So there's different ways to take them out. We can use their previous incision under the fold. We can use a vertical type incision, almost like a lift incision. And those are the predominant ways we do it. In this instance, I took them out through the fold as they were put in. And you try to take it out intact so that you're not disrupting any of the materials. You're not spreading anything if it has an infection or if it has a lymphoma or cancer in it. So, I took these out, I opened them on the back table. I'm like, these things are all gooey. They're not ruptured, they're just covered in this goo. That's not normal. No, no. So, I went out and told her husband, I'm like, she's going to get better. I think these were just infected.

Yeah.

And I just need to wait for the results. And so, traditional techniques as we've talked about this conference throughout today are limited in medicine. So, some of them have practiced since you and I combined have been alive. They're the same. Take a Q-tip essentially, swab an area that's got worrisome for bacteria or fungi or whatever, and then send it off to the lab and they incubate it.

Just like the strep throat test that I used to get.

And this has been around forever. So, this came back normal, like nothing.

And I was like, "No." The one from the implants that you took out that had the goo on them came back normal.

And I was like, "There's no way this is possible." So, I got frustrated and I said, "Okay, we're going to start looking at PCR testing." So, for the audience during the pandemic, that antigen testing and PCR testing. PCR testing looks for DNA fragments of different pathogens, bacteria, fungi, mycobacteria. So, I got in touch with a lab, MicrogenDX, and now they've done all of my samples consecutively since February of 2019. We have a series that's being published of over 900 consecutive samples where about a third of them have a biofilm, in this instance, a bacteria. And the bacteria is Cutibacterium acnes. It's found in extremely high concentrations on the face.

You said it again, how's it called?

Cutibacterium acnes. It's what you find in acne.

Sounds sweet and innocent. Cutie.

But it readily produces biofilm. Film. And so, for everybody listening, biofilm makes it so your body can't attack it and kill it.

Right. It's like a shield, like a gooey shield.

And it's perfectly suited for this, right? You have a foreign body, you have something that readily produces biofilm, it attaches, and it switches on your immune system. Right. And it can't shut off. And the longer these folks go, as you would imagine, they get adrenal fatigue. They get chronic inflammatory symptoms. They get gut dysfunction. They get brain fog. They get arrhythmias. They get shortness of breath. Every system becomes affected.

Is that because the bacteria is able to spread outside the implant and the biofilm grows elsewhere beyond the implant?

So, that's not known yet, but there is a current study that was done. It upregulates something called tinhome. So, when staph is around an implant, That biofilm upregulates tenhrom. It increases the symptomology of breast implant illness. So, in my patient population, the predominant organism, the bacteria is not Staph. It's this Cutibacterium. Now, my— for everybody listening, my patient population is not in Austin predominantly. I have patients come from all over the United States and all over the world. So, I just operated before I came here on somebody from Singapore. So, I think mine's a more representative analysis of a more continental United States, if you will, look versus a localized clinic. So, I feel like that. And if you look in the literature, there's lots of examples of Cutibacterium acnes readily producing biofilm. You can find it on shoulder implants because that's an area where—

Oh, I was going to ask you, there's an issue with implants that go beyond just breast.

Yes. Yes, yes, yes. With this bacteria especially.

Okay.

Alright.

So, you're finding all this out, you send it off to your MicroGen, what's it called? MicroGenDX laboratory. Yeah. What do you do next?

So, the thing that we've gone to doing is, first of all, we're super holistic in how we approach taking care of the patient. We'll go back a little bit. So, after we started running these analyses, now we kind of see the real information. So, instead of seeing 1 positive result or 2 a month, now we're seeing 2 or 3 a week because the analysis is so much more sensitive and specific to look for the bacteria. So now, we're like, "Oh, this is a lot bigger problem than we thought initially." So now, I feel about a third of the devices, I just can't tell you the timeframe whether it's 5 years, 10 years out, 15 years out, have biofilm.

When you say devices, you mean implants?

Implants, yes. So, when we're looking at them, that's why I said in 2.2 million placed worldwide annually, if you just run it up 10 years and then a third of those will potentially have a biofilm issue.

Have you ever had a chance to look at an implant that's pretty new, like less than 5 years old, to see if— how quickly the biofilm actually develops post-implant?

I have a smaller number of that sample size. And, because it's so small, it doesn't hold up when you analyze this.

Have you ever talked to somebody whose symptoms set in almost immediately after they get the implant?

Yeah, yeah. And, there's some people, as you imagine, they are very sensitive. And, that goes back to what we were talking about earlier today. I do a lot of genetic analysis to look at people. And, for me to work with you now, it's really you have to run the program we have set up, the SHARP process because we're looking at your genetics using Envision Labs because we talked about earlier. I really want to have everybody have as individualized program for them based on their genetic.

Yeah. We talked about just to the audience, I was earlier at the conference, you were discussing pharmacogenetics. So, you're actually able to do a genetic test on somebody, figure out how they actually metabolize certain pharmaceuticals and choose their drug dosing protocol accordingly.

Yeah.

It's pretty cool.

Exceptionally important in this patient population who have high amounts of chronic inflammation. Because imagine I operate on you and you have chronic inflammation. If we don't do work to help address that on the front end through the program, so we look at your genetics, we do a tox test to look at your environmental tox burden, phthalates, MEPs, BPAs, glyphosates. We look at heavy metals, we look at mycotoxins. We're really trying to prepare you and look at everything including gut microbiome, dysbiosis, food sensitivities, hormone balance so that we get a broad enough picture so that we can get as proactive as possible upfront. So, we use really nutrient-dense supplementation and liposomal formulation.

So— This is all part of the implant removal process.

Yes. This is part of my process. So, that's why people come and take part in our process. There's a lot of upfront work. And, because of the pandemic, we just started doing everything in-house with our functional team.

Got it. Now, you use the acronym SHARP when you're describing your protocol. What's that sample?

So, SHARP is Strategic Holistic Accelerated Recovery Program. So, it starts with your genetic testing, your toxicity testing, your gut health testing, and that's the strategic part. Yeah, your food testing and your hormone balance. And then, we really tried to avoid antibiotics. We really tried to get nutritional support started as soon as possible. Gluten-free, dairy-free, seed oil-free diets, higher in good proteins and healthy fats. And then, in terms of—

And that's the holistic part.

Yeah. And we want all of this starting pre so that we're accelerating the recovery process by starting it proactive. And then, once you get to Austin, you're going to spend a week with us in Austin. You're going to have your pre-op appointment with us, the day before surgery. You go through the surgical process where we really limit the amount of narcotics. You had Dr. Chestnut on. I know he talked about doing opioid-free. Now, this is not a Twilight case. This is under general anesthesia. This is a lot more intrusive. So, my team is extremely careful about not using long-acting narcotics. So, short-acting always. We do an ERAS, which is enhanced recovery after surgery. Use gabapentin the night before, Celebrex, really good COX-2 anti-inflammatory, and then Zofran to help really— we want to reduce as much nausea, inflammation, and—

That's what the Zofran is for.

Yeah, nerve stimulation because obviously, I'm going to ramp it up during surgery. And then, in surgery, Our anesthesia team is providing peripheral nerve blocks. So, we're trying to really address before we ever do anything, blocking pain.

For people who haven't had a nerve block before, can you quickly give me the overview of what that is?

Yeah.

So, we've had it and it seems pretty effective.

Yes. If you just think of the spinal column on our vertebra, the ribs pop out, come around from back to front. There's nerves out of each level. Below the rib, vein, artery, nerve, and they can under ultrasound go back, block that area so you get wraparound coverage.

Mm-hmm.

And then on the sides, they'll block a, a little area near the serratus anterior and latissimus dorsi on the front that helps give more coverage here. And then we're actually doing the surgery, our exposure's really good and I use a lighted retractor so I can see the pocket like you're looking at a cave with a headlight. And then, I will inject directly the tissues where I've been operating. So, we get really good dense anesthesia before folks wake up because we want everybody in a kind of a 2, 3 zone when you wake up out of 10. We feel like that's where the sweet spot is. And if you wake up that way, you're going to go home, you know, you're going to— or go back to your hotel or Airbnb, And the recovery is so much better because you're not groggy, you're not lethargic, you're able to eat, right? So, we give everybody this— everybody's been to Austin knows about The Well. The Well is a seed oil-free, gluten-free, dairy-free restaurant.

We have a partnership with them.

Oh, good.

No, I'll be in Austin in a couple weeks.

So, we have everybody— we have a program with them for our patients because I want our patients to do a low inflammatory diet. Yeah. And, I think most people really want to eat this way, they just don't know how or haven't experienced it.

I'm guessing you didn't learn a lot of that holistic stuff in medical school. So, I'm curious how you came to even be aware of any of that or start to implement that with your patients.

Yeah. So, it's interesting. I've always been curious about genetics ever since college. And, the Genome Project started really in '95, didn't get completed for a very long period of time because the computers weren't, you know, strong enough, quick enough. And when I got into solo private practice, I shared space with a functional medicine provider, super talented, was really giving with his time, and his team helped me with nutritional support, taught me about mold, and then I did additional, you you know, kind of online programming for toxicity training. And then when, you know, the pandemic happened, we could no longer refer out to it because they couldn't see anybody. So then when we resumed, we just brought it all in-house and started doing it with our functional team. So I had functional practitioners now.

So, you call this an explant, right? When you do everything you just described to remove the implant. Uh-huh. How many women have a desire after that to still get implants or still engage in some kind of aesthetic or cosmetic procedure?

Yeah, that's a great question. So, I feel like it's a really big decision. And obviously, I don't decide for them to have an explant. They've come to that conclusion. I provide information to make an informed decision. I think the next step, and what we're trying to always improve upon, are our fat transfer results. So, if many patients were offered in the first place, a transfer of fat from one place in the body to the breast kind of like they do for—

But very common in cosmetic surgeons.

Yes. That would have been acceptable if they only chose to have a cup size improvement. The discussion becomes, Ben, when somebody wants more than a cup size, 2 cup sizes, 2.5 cup sizes.

That's a lot of fat.

You can't do it. So then, you're in the implant territory or you have somebody early in life, low BMI, not enough fat obviously. They're going to go down the pathway of the implant. So when we're looking at my patients now, average age is going to be like 45. They've had kids, they've had implants for a long period of time. We accumulate more body fat in the love handle area, the abdomen, the inner outer thighs. So we can do a rejuvenative type procedure, take that fat, do the explant with a lift and fat transfer as we, you know, see fit in those patients. Who are in line with that and their testing lines up with and supports doing that.

Right. That makes sense. And, one impression that I'm getting here, especially when you mention young people who want to go up a few cup sizes, guys, if you're listening in, make sure you compliment your significant other on their boobs. I'm glad after talking to you so far that my wife never got implants. And, I think it's a very good idea to make sure that a woman feels comfortable with her body. Absolutely. And, we live in a society that I think doesn't do us any service when it comes to girls being potentially embarrassed or self-conscious about that part of their body.

Absolutely. Mindset has been affected from the time they were little. Yeah. And when you talk to them and hear their stories, they're very disheartening. Yeah. Because of that. And you need to be a super supportive other or spouse or friend or however that looks because those women need that support. And we have partnered with Amanda Savage-Brown who wrote the book, Busting Free. And she's had each other's plant. Yeah. And, she's a psychologist.

She's wonderful. Is that what the book "Busting Free" is about? Is that plants?

Yes. She's really a unique individual. So, we align with her and our patients reach out and spend time with her. And, we have folks on our detox team. So, we run a very aggressive detox program with Cellcore. So, once you get your testing and everything's crafted in terms of the surgical plan and the supplement plan, And there's a detox plan.

So, they're all— That's pre or post-surgery, the detox?

We'll do probably phase 1 depending on logistics before surgery because some people need several months to get everything lined up to come spend time with us. But, it's super important to get started right away with— I would say just like you understand and your audience does, when you don't know how unhealthy you are and how nutrient deficient you are, Once you get started and you start making progress and lowering your inflammation, it makes a big difference in how you feel and interact and your energy levels even before the surgery. So, I think as soon as we can start that process, we want to.

Yeah. Do you use stem cells at all for any part of this?

So, I have the American Cell device and I've done fat transfers like—

The American Cell device?

Yeah. So, you can take fat out, and spin it. And in about an hour and 40 minutes, have your stem cells, your mesenchymal—

Like take someone's own fat, put it in a centrifuge, spin it, it's all autologous, their own fat, and you can get their stem cells right there to use to, well, like accelerate healing for the protocol from the explant. Yeah.

So, you can give them to them IV or if you're doing a local fat transfer, sometimes I do fat transfers later on, 6, 8 months out. Awake under local in the office, you can do it then as well. Okay.

How much does— I don't even know how much an implant costs. So, what's the price of an explant compared to, say, what somebody might pay for an implant?

Yeah. So, the implant costs themselves will vary, you know, around probably $5,000 to $10,000 depending on who's doing that. Explants, far more complicated process, we're starting around $20,000. And those will go up depending on what we're doing in terms of programming, lifting, fat transfers. We also offer skin tightening. So anybody 35 plus, their skin's not getting tighter. As you know, it's getting looser.

Yeah.

Take fat from it, you, you affect the, the tonicity of it. So I provide radiofrequency skin tightening that's very safe and effective. It's been used for decades now. We offer that to all the, the women who have kids, especially the lower abdomen can be lax. So we want to do as much as we can at one time to help offset both what they're worried about in terms of image, but not create new things that are going to be problematic in other areas.

If you get an explant, does that mean that your breast size returns to what it would have been before you got your implant, or is it smaller or larger than that?

Yeah, I think it's a two-parter. So in the low BMI patient who's still low BMI, they're still going to be at a deficit. And then, the patient who kind of will say more has, you know, moderate weight gain over time, much easier process. They typically started with a little bit more tissue. So, it's always best if you have more tissue to begin with for me because then I can reshape it and then I can add volume back to it. And, that's the best situation for the patient.

This is possibly a dumb question, but just thinking about like the mammary glands and this whole idea of implants, explants, Does any of this play into a woman's capability to breastfeed?

No. No, they can still breastfeed. Say when I'm taking them out, most of the implants in the United States placed since 1996 are behind the muscle. Okay. So, they're really— you're not dealing with the breast so much. Right. So then, it becomes how affected is the muscle. And many people promote muscle repair. And I think You're an athlete. So, if you tore a muscle and it was unrepaired like a bicep, what would happen? Atrophy. Yeah. Just curls up. Yeah. So, a muscle to function for the audience needs to be connected, origin insertion. And so, when you release part of its insertion, it changes from— Right. And muscles just don't get—

You're doing like a full bicep tear where you literally see it curl up and peel away.

Yeah.

Friend give that. Yeah.

You can't just pull muscles down. Yeah. You just can't pull muscles down. So, it's like a broken window shade. It's there and it'll be fine over time as it heals and restores what we'd call a resting length. Because people I've had, say for instance, somebody's in a military environment and they have implants because that happens and they need to get them removed for one reason or another and they pass their physical training test, Then, they come see me. They want to have an explant, then they have a whole year to recover basically. And, in particular, they'll get almost right back to their bench and their pull-up and push-up and whatever testing parameters there are. And so, it's possible. It's totally within the realm to get almost back to the same physical type condition. It's just the pace at which you do it. We try to govern that so you don't potentially tear your pec because it's going to be weaker after surgery.

Yeah. Yeah. Do you do or is any of this covered by insurance?

So, we don't have anything related to insurance reimbursement for this at this point. I think groups are looking into how to help get parts of this covered. I stopped doing insurance work for cancer-related problems in 2019. So, we haven't submitted and don't participate in any plans now.

Is there a safe way to to do an implant, do you think?

I think the way I look at it, I get asked all the time.

Not just a fat transfer with an actual implant.

But, people try to pigeonhole me and they're like, "Oh, Dr. Whitfield, if your daughter wanted implants, what would you do?" Yeah. Okay, this is what I would do. I know my daughter's genetics. I also know her toxicity testing. I would say if you're a provider and your client comes in and says you want this, Those are things that I know that are pretty specific. And if you have limitations in detox and you start with a poor tox test, that's not a good situation.

If you're just a poor genetic detoxifier in general, yeah, that's a problem.

Yeah.

So, those would be like glutathione pathways, for example?

Yeah. You can have really stripped-down capability, as you know, and be suboptimal in vitamin D synthesis.

Yeah.

In methylation, in glutathionization, in antioxidant pathways. You have those, you're setting yourself up not for just a difficult life of detoxification in general in a very, very complicated world, but then you're going to add a device.

And, you can't just take N-acetylcysteine and transdermal glutathione and all the things.

Unless you live in the bubble.

Yeah, yeah, which is uncommon.

Yeah.

So, the genetic test that you use, which one is it?

So, we use Envision Labs and I think I always want to do and provide what I think will be the best situation for you. So, who has the most genes available that are going to provide the most valuable information plus give us the pharmacogenetic data that—

That's the one that tells you how you process drugs.

Yeah. I mean, that is like next level.

You don't see that a lot on genetic tests.

No, no. I've been waiting and waiting and using different vendors and You know, to me, like, it's all in your code. Like, and the more we learn about it, the more efficient we can become about helping you, you know, both before and during and after surgery. Because that's, you know, that's why people are coming. They want to recover well, quickly, efficiently, and feel as good as possible so they can live their best versions of themselves.

Yeah. So back to the question about what you would do if your daughter wanted an implant, you said you'd look at toxicology. Anything else?

Yeah. So, I know her genetics are toxic, but my daughter, for everybody listening, is a Leo and she's not going to listen to me. Okay. So, I would provide her the information so she can make her best informed decision.

Yeah. It's a love and logic style of parenting. That's how we raised our kids. Just not a lot of yeses or nos, just educate them about their consequences or all the inconsequences of a decision that they make, then let them make the decision. So, as far as the actual biofilm piece. It sounds to me like you're saying that you haven't seen a whole lot of evidence that it spreads throughout the body but that the body responds systemically to the bacteria and the biofilm that's localized to the implants. Yeah.

I think it boils down to our limitations in testing. We worked with a startup after the pandemic who looked at chronic inflammatory testing through urine, thromboxane A2 metabolites specifically. And it was good but not great. So, if you had taken in your diet turmeric or other anti-inflammatories or antioxidants, it would affect the test. So, we had some people who had no knowledge of those types of things in their diet and we have the test up front and then we would change their diet. You can see their inflammatory marker go down. So, we know we can do that. Systemically, we don't know what the biofilm is doing, because it doesn't really pop up. If you check Lp, if you check CRP, if you check sed rate, you're not really going to get the indication of what's going on. And, it's frustrating, but all of us have biofilm. I mean, the breast in particular is concerning for me because of the nipple complex connection to the ductal system. It's uniquely situated to have connection to the outside world and you can have more or different types of biofilm.

Yeah. Yeah. Do you ever do gut testing such as, let's say, a Genova Diagnostics evaluation or a fungal evaluation and find any patterns of more fungal overgrowth in implant patients? I ask that, but probably you see where I'm going here just because you tend to see so much biofilm with fungal overgrowth if there's some correlation between implants and fungal overgrowth.

We do GI maps on virtually everybody and there's no correlation between that and the fungal overgrowth. I've only had 6 have fungus out of 900 so far.

Yeah.

Yeah. Or actually over 1,000.

So, let's say somebody can't get all the fancy testing and everything and a woman is listening in and suspects based on the fact that she has implants that she might have this. You briefly ran through the symptoms earlier in the show, but can you run down what they'd actually look? But let's say they can't do blood testing and everything. What are they going to feel that might give them a clue that they could have breast implant illness?

Right. So, I think from head to toe, I do the symptom inventory like this. I would do sound sensitivity, light sensitivity, headache. You can have sinus symptoms, pressure, pain in the sinus area. And, you can may have what's termed sinusitis, but it's not able to be treated by an antibiotic. Right. People will will kind of refract or reflexively treat you with that and it won't go away because this is not a bacterial phenomenon, it's inflammation. They'll have dry eyes, very characteristic problem. And then, as you go down the systems, they'll have difficulty with swallowing and they feel like something's catching almost like an eosinophilic esophagitis, like a swelling almost. You can have even pain in the esophagus like chest pains and chest pressure, shortness of breath, heart palpitations, lots of kind of very concerning cardiovascular symptoms, respiratory symptoms, like I said, shortness of breath, pain, pressure, things that are obviously when you hear those, those are very disconcerting symptoms. Yeah. Especially in folks who have kids, and they're taking care of their families and their spouses and running the household. When you go down, think of like extremities, you can have neurologic symptoms. You can have shooting pains. You can have neuropathic pain, heat, pins and needles. You can have vibratory pain. Your whole body can kind of vibrate. And those can be in the arms and legs, muscle cramping, muscle pain, joint pain, migratory joint pain. And then, the GI and the GU. So, the GI tract can have all sorts of anomalies, right? You can have just things like not just nausea, not just diarrhea and constipation, but crampy pain, swelling, bloating, belly pain, all the things plus intractable urinary tract infection.

That's crazy. All for an implant. Geez. Now, kind of a fringe question I realized that would apply to a smaller subset of the population, but I know some guys have gotten calf implants. A lot of bodybuilders will get implants for a specific vanity part. You ever treat anybody who's gotten something besides a breast implant? You mentioned the shoulder implants, for example.

Yeah, I've taken calf implants out of several women because they were experiencing what they perceived as symptoms from that. Now, I would say those are different biofilm, they're different implants. We did not have biofilm on the small sample, but any implants will cause a response. And then, it's biofilm or not, your body's still responding to it because it's foreign.

Yeah, yeah. Could you make the implant theoretically out of a different kind of material? Could someone invent some kind of matrices that's resistant to bacteria, resistant to biofilm?

Yeah, because it's foreign. I don't know if that's something that they've tried to do different things to the surface to help with that. Nothing yet that's made sense. And in the kind of the knee worlds and the hip worlds, I mean, those guys have huge implants and you're going to lose function if they have to take it out. So, it's very— when you are around those folks, they're super focused on no joint infections ever. Yeah.

So, you can't make a breast implant out of ceramic and titanium.

No.

I mean, you could, but you'd have kind of like a Viking woman in that case. Comes with the hat with the spikes on it. Alright. How about the idea? I just have to ask you this because I'm curious if you know anything about this related to breast health. I hear more and more these days, especially from the holistic crowd, that bra choice could be an issue like tight bra, breast blood flow from tight-fitting bras, et cetera. Have you ever come across anything like that?

Yeah. I think it's a good shot because we do see a lot of restriction of lymphatic flow. And for the audience, your lymphatic drainage is crucial in recovery. So, my office, we have a hyperbaric oxygen chamber, we have a lymphatic masseuse, we have lymphatic massage devices, we have red light therapy. So, we're trying to decrease inflammation, upregulate your hormones that are going to help you with recovery, but really promote lymphatic massage. And your lymphatic system above any other drainage system that exists is the most efficient. So, if you can really leverage that and The tightness of the bra to me is not a blood flow issue, it's a lymphatic flow issue restrictor because it takes barely any pressure to restrict the lymphatic.

Right. It also takes barely any pressure to massage the lymphatic. Correct.

You have to know how to do that. Yeah.

I'll try and write it down and put in the shownotes. By the way, it's at BenGreenfieldLife.com/implants. There's a guy named Perry Nichols and he has the Big 6 lymphatic drainage where you go collarbones to back of the neck down to chest to stomach to groin. The back of the knees and you're kind of rubbing and patting each of those sections and finishing with some rebounding or trampolining, right? You get the lymph fluid going. But what's a— you said you have a lymph massage device?

Yeah. So, we have two in our office. We have the Balancer Pro out of Germany and we have Flopressor, which is out of New Zealand. Each of these is very good at reducing the swelling that accumulates after surgery. So, the Balancer works both on upper and lower body, like a pair of trousers for the lower and then a jacket for the top. And then Flowpresso, you lay down on the actual table and you need an assistant to actually put you in the leg portion. And then, there's an abdomen portion and an arm portion.

Oh, so you're pulling on a suit. This isn't like a wand or something like that.

Correct.

These are suits.

I went very away. Yeah. These are suits in the office. And the runtimes particularly will say between 30 and 45 minutes. And our pressures are always low. Everybody listening, lymphatic drainage, we'll say just low and slow. Keep it low pressure. So, things like Normatec, too high a pressure.

Those are the gradated recovery boosters. Yeah, yeah.

You've got to really understand you're going to cause more problems with higher pressures. The lymphatic system really responds to low-pressure and gentle massage. So, 45 minutes at a pressure setting of 45. And then, for Filopresso, it has a heating component which is really good, especially on the abdomen. It helps you get into more of a parasympathetic state.

How much does a device like that cost? Like, could people have them in their homes?

Yes. Those are between—

something like— I like to see another cool biohacking device that's It's awesome.

And I use— Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. So, for everybody listening, my regimen is I work out Monday, Wednesday, Friday between 5:30 and 6:30, and I operate Tuesday, Thursday between 6:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. So, on off days, after I go to the gym, I go get my hyperbaric chamber, I get a lymphatic massage, do red light, I get to work.

So, you have all that at your clinic anyway. What do your workouts look like? So, Wednesday-Friday routines?

Yeah, I do an hour. I'm mostly in 60 to 75% in zone 3, a little zone 2. I don't do much zone 4, and I'm more functional mobility rather than any heavy weights or heavy cardio. I do the machine that kills me is the Versa Climber, which I hate, but yeah, it's my little nemesis.

Yeah, yeah. What about the weekends? Are you doing anything on the weekends?

I try to really spend time with my family on the weekends. And, my son's getting ready to move to Europe. He's going to coach and play soccer there. And, my daughter is going to be a junior in high school. So, I'm really trying to be as available as I can. Yeah.

Were you a soccer player?

I played basketball. Really? Soccer was not a thing. I'm almost 55. So, that was not a thing, but our country has now become a soccer country.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, for people listening who are interested in learning more about the The SHARP, I get that right, the SHAPE or SHARP? SHARP. Yeah, SHARP. Nailed it. Asking me about that despite the mezcal. The SHARP program, the name of your clinic, just fill folks in on where they go and what to ask for if they heard this and they have a loved one they are concerned about or they themselves are interested in this explant procedure.

Right. To learn more information about breast implant illness, we have breastimplantillnessexpert.com. You can follow us on Instagram @breastimplantillnessexpert. And then I have a podcast just devoted to breast implant illness. Oh, really? So you can go to that show. We also have our supplements on drrobsolutions.com, but you can link to it from my site. We also have the Sharp Program linking from our site. And then you can get the genetic testing from our site through Envision Labs.

On your podcast, are you like interviewing patients or surgeons or how's that work?

So, I've done patient interviews and then I've actually had a couple interviews with some very interesting guests because obviously for me, as you've heard me talk about today, I'm very passionate about both air quality, fluid intake, and food quality. So, I've had the owners of the restaurant, The Well, in Austin on my show.

I've had— I have to go to, by the way.

Yeah. We'll get you. We'll take you. And then, we just recently interviewed the founder of Echo, the water company.

Oh, yeah, the hydrogen water bottle. Yeah. I just checked out that earlier. Yeah.

And so, for me, I'm very passionate about if you just make these changes which you obviously know and talk about to your audience, you'll see incremental improvement. And, it's not all going to change overnight. You have to start. And, when you begin, you will make progress.

Yeah, yeah. Dr. Rob Woodfield, everybody. Clink, clank. You somehow finished your drink before me even though you did most of the talking. BenGreenfieldLife.com/implant. Leave your questions, your comments, your feedback. I read them all.

Dr.

Rob can take a look if there's anything that blows my mind that I pass on to him. In the meantime, thanks for listening. Have an amazing week and share this episode with anyone who you think might benefit from it, particularly those in your life who have an implant and are showing some of the signs and symptoms that Rob talked about. So, until next time. I'm Ben Greenfield and Dr. Rob Whitfield signing off from BenGreenfieldLife.com. Have an amazing week.

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