A short interview with plastic surgeon Robert Whitfield MD about breast implant illness. Dr. Whitfield describes having removed a large number of implants and recognizing patients whose systemic symptoms (for example, fatigue) improved quickly after explantation; he also recounts missing an implant infection earlier which changed his practice. The host emphasizes Dr. Whitfield’s attentive listening and growing influence on how clinicians think about implant-related illness.
Chapters
So what I thought I'd do is I'd find a top expert in the country on breast implants and that we'd have a real serious conversation about it. Rob Whitfield is here on the show and he's done a lot of breast implants, and you've taken probably more out than you put in by far.
Yes.
So most people who put breast implants into women. So we'll sort of tell you on Swearo on penalty of death, breast implants are harmless. But at some point, you must have had a wake up call to figure out that this wasn't working.
I took a large number out, and when I look back at my experience, I was taking care of folks with this problem without knowing I was taking care of folks with this problem. I had missed a breast implant infection.
And so.
That really bothered me. Magically. Her fatigue was all better in a month, and this one shaped how I practiced moving forward.
The reason that I wanted to have you on the show today is when I sat down and talked with you a couple months ago, I was just impressed, number one, that you listen to your patients in a way that a lot of physicians don't, because you can't have all this stuff going on. So your ability to listen was really strong. But also just over the last five or so years, it seems like you've unpacked the problem in a way that's. That's really changed how a lot of people think about it. So I would consider you to be one of our top experts in the illness around what's happening in the breast implants, what's going on in the body.
