It does depend on the procedure

Postoperative pain from breast augmentation is dependent on many factors, some of which have been touched on by other respondents.  One significant factor is the position that the implant is placed in, above the muscle or below the muscle.  Below the muscle is a much more painful procedure.  So, if its pain that you fear, consultation with your board certified plastic surgeon will determine if this is an option for your body characteristics.  If it is not, then other methods of pain management are available, such as the pain pump, or injecting long acting local anesthestic at the completion of your procedure.  Good luck!

I have also heard women complain of severe pain after breast augmentation, and I find it puzzling.  My patients don't complain of significant pain.  There will be some more discomfort if the implants are put under the muscle.

Some of the tricks to  minimize pain:

1) MOST IMPORTANT, is GENTLE SHARP  dissection to create the implant pocket (instead of  "blunt dissection" which means ripping the tissues with the finger).

2) Stop absolutely all the bleeding.

3) Don't use  an excessively large implant for the particular patient's anatomy.

4) Put the patient in a comfortable elastic bra immediately.

5) The patient should keep her elbows close to her body for a week.

6) Don't massage or manipulate the breasts in any way.

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lil,

This is a great question. I have found that the recovery from breast implant surgery depends mostly on patient motivation and patient response to previous surgery. For highly motivated patients, who are informed and who play an active role in there pre- and post-op tend to do better. Additionally, people who normally hit the alarm clock repeatedly every morning tend to have longer recoveries. Likewise, people who get out of bed as soon as the alarm clock goes off tend to recover faster. Another useful gauge is people who call in sick to work frequently will likely have a longer recover while patients who have never missed a day of work will most likely recover faster. Whoever does your surgery should also give you pain medications and muscle relaxers to help get over the initial hump of surgery. After that, most patients tend to do very well.

Good luck with your surgery.

David Shafer, MD
Shafer Plastic Surgery - Manhattan

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