Robert Whitfield MDAmerica's Breast Implant Illness Expert™

Breast Implants & Illness: Why Some Suffer, Others Don't #shorts

6 Nov 2025 · 1 min

Watch on YouTube

1:10

Short interview excerpt where Robert Whitfield MD discusses why some people develop breast implant illness while others do not. He attributes a substantial role to biofilm infections (noting ~35% prevalence in his cohort of 1,500+ explant patients) and to host genetic predisposition — citing that affected individuals often have three to four dysfunctional immune/inflammatory pathways on genetic testing.

Questions this video answers

1,500 plus

35%

Three to four pathways

Several hundred genetic reports

They get better

Chapters

Why do some people, in your opinion, get breast implant illness while others don't? Because obviously there's a lot of people with implants and some may not even notice an issue. And some obviously are starting to have issues.
Yeah, I think in the simple way to think about it, in our experience, which encompasses 1,500 plus, now 35% have biofilm. So I'll just say for everybody in the audience, so biofilm to me is an infection. I will always just say in those, regardless of their genetics, you take it out, they get better. Right. But what you're asking is the more complicated question is who's actually predisposed to have a problem? And so from genetics, you have to be, in my opinion, after looking at several hundred genetic reports on people with breast implants who have explanted, you have to have three to four of those pathways. I mentioned not working properly. And just like Candice, our patient advocate, she had all four that didn't work properly. Whether or not you know that that person is going to be uniquely susceptible to increasing amounts of inflammation, regardless of the device. Hip implant, knee implant, breast implant, dental implant.