Robert Whitfield MDAmerica's Breast Implant Illness Expert™

Breast Explant Scars: The Lollipop Technique Explained #shorts

10 Dec 2025 · 1 min

Watch on YouTube

1:28

Short YouTube video by Robert Whitfield MD explaining scar patterns and technique options for breast explant surgery. He states explantation can be performed through three approaches — the fold (inframammary), a vertical (lollipop) incision, or a periareolar incision — and explains that the vertical/lollipop technique is used when the surgeon wants to narrow and lift a wide, boxy breast by advancing tissue from below the nipple to elevate nipple position. He notes the nipple is preserved (not removed) and that prior periareolar incisions can be revised by tangentially excising skin around the areola to fit a smaller breast.

Questions this video answers

Through the fold (inframammary), through a vertical (lollipop), or through a periareolar approach.

No — you do not take the nipple off.

Chapters

In those instances where we want to narrow and lift the breast, we're going to use a vertical technique, often referred to when you look at the scar pattern as a lollipop. Today we're going to discuss the question, will I have scars after breast explant surgery? So explant surgery for me is done through either the fold, through a vertical, or through a periareolar approach. And so let me delve into what that means relative to the breast size and shape. So allow me to, you know, be a little liberal with how I I think about this and try to explain my thoughts. If you have a wide breast that extends into your armpits, you're going to want that narrowed. Otherwise, when you remove the device itself, it may be more flattened and boxy at the bottom. So in those instances where we want to narrow and lift the breast, we're going to use a vertical technique, often referred to when you look at the scar pattern as a lollipop. So that allows us to take tissue from below the nipple complex and advance and lift the tissue as we close it. That's how you get an increased or elevated nipple position. You do not take the nipple off. Many times people have had lifts. I'm just revising that incision by carefully tangentially excising skin around the areola to make it fit a smaller breast.