Robert Whitfield MD explains breast reconstruction after cancer, covering advances in nerve-sparing and muscle-sparing surgery. An abdominal flap using your own tissue gives the most natural result and uses the same incision as a tummy tuck. The Artura tissue expander works well for petite women but has limits for larger breasts.
Mentor
The same incision used for a tummy tuck.
Our practice is a little unique in that although we do aesthetic surgery, still a large component of our practice is under the care of women with breast cancer. Microsurgery and advancements in microsurgery have made it easier to perform nerve sparing, muscle sparing procedures. So if someone wants to have their own tissue used for the breast reconstruction, I use the exact same incision I would for a tummy tuck. I leave it connected to the blood vessels of the abdomen that run right through the rectus muscle. So that gives you really the most natural form of reconstruction. So the artura is a tissue expander that's created by Mentor, and for me, its place is really with petite women. Most tissue expanders are too wide for petite women. This expander is narrow. So this works really, really well for those patients. If there's an issue with the volume, if it's a large, large breast, we're not going to try to do that at one time.
