Robert Whitfield MD (a surgeon) recounts a career-changing anecdote: he became an MD in 1996 and has ~30 years of surgical experience by 2026, with 20 years focused on cancer patients and reconstruction using microsurgery. In 2016 a breast cancer reconstruction patient consulted him for removal (explant) of breast implants; the patient had chronic fatigue (likely from bone marrow suppression) without other abnormal labs, and Dr. Whitfield performed the explant.
Questions this video answers
1996.
2016.
30 years.
Chapters
Tell us about the career changing moment you had with a cancer patient that made you, you know, pivot from breast implants to breast implant removal.
Right. So I've been an MD since 1996. In 2026, it'll be 30 years of just doing surgery. I spent 20 of those just taking care of cancer patients predominantly. So I did head and neck reconstruction, I did basically any kind of extremity reconstruction. And then predominantly because of the prevalence of breast cancer, both in the United States and around the world, I did breast cancer reconstruction using a technique that involved microsurgery. And that's where I got introduced to caring for patients with breast implant based reconstruction who had problems either from radiation treatment, infection, just because they have so many more surgeries. And it was a patient, as you mentioned in 2016 that came to me for consultation regarding removal of their breast implants after breast reconstruction that I took to the operating room. I did the explant procedure for the patient. And if you go back in our history, like many cancer patients, will suffer from chronic fatigue because of bone marrow suppression after their treatments. It's a pretty common problem. It's a really unfortunate problem after cancer therapies. And this patient had fatigue, no other symptomology, no other issues on laboratory exams, blood work studies. And then after I did her expo plant, I always do things the same way.
