Robert Whitfield MDAmerica's Breast Implant Illness Expert™

Breast Implant Illness: Why It Happens & What You Need to Know #shorts

11 Nov 2025 · 1 min

Watch on YouTube

1:12

A short YouTube interview with Robert Whitfield MD about breast implant illness. Dr. Whitfield, a plastic surgeon with over 25 years' experience in oncologic and breast reconstruction, explains that implants are foreign devices that can cause more problems than autologous tissue. He describes his use of the DIEP free flap (lower abdominal tissue with preserved blood supply) and fat transfer for natural breast reconstruction and notes extensive experience with these techniques.

Chapters

And so that's what we're going to do today. We're going to unpack breast implant illness. What is it? Why does it happen? You've been a plastic surgeon for over 25 years, putting implants in and now taking them all out. So let's, let's unpack it. What? Like, sure.
For your audience. I did and performed oncologic or cancer reconstruction predominantly throughout my career. That was my passion. My sister was a breast cancer survivor until recently. This year she passed away. But taking care of women with breast cancer and or problems that developed after treatment and because implants are a foreign device, they're going to have more problems than your own tissue. So basically what I did was an elegant operation called the DIEP free flap, and that used the tissue of the lower abdomen and it maintained its blood supply. And then we revascularized it on the chest in a way that would allow us to create a natural holistic breast form that we could add to with fat transfer. So I've done many thousand free flap breast reconstructions. I've done many thousand fat transfers for that patient population. It's near and dear to me.