Implants Rippling in Cleavage Area

I had textured over filled saline implants, partial unders, for 11 years. They started to ripple in the cleavage area the past year. They had apparently twisted around. I just replaced them 14 days ago with a smaller gel implant. I still have tons of ripples in the cleavage area, and my doctor says to wait and be calm about how they will settle.

However, I do not feel like these ripples will disapper. I am thin with thin skin.What is causing this? Did he not know this could be an issue? Is it the memory of the scar tissue from my previous implants? How can I fix it? Please help, my doctor won't help and refuses to address the problem!

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4 Doctor Answers | Asked by NikiSue in Denver

Doctor Answers (4)
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Rippling of implants hard to correct

Rippling is a tough problem to correct. This is usually the result of a very thing soft tissue coverage. Sometimes alloderm is used to add another layer of coverage in the affected area.

Steven Wallach, MD

12 reviews

Manhattan Plastic Surgeon

Thin soft tissue can show as ripples

Hello, This can be a difficult problem. If your tissues are so thin that silicone implants show ripples and you are already "under the muscle" with those implants, you are in a difficult place. There are ways out of this is some circumstances but I would need to examine you to see what could be done.

Thinned tissue shows ripples

I cannot address your discussions with your plastic surgeon but it sounds like the tissue between your breasts was stretched by the first surgery. Silicone implants can help because although they too ripple, they are less inclined to. It also depends on what the status of the muscle is between your breasts. If it was divided at the breast bone, this is a difficult problem to correct and you may always have ripples. I hope this helps. Dr Edwards

This is a difficult problem - Lack of soft tissue coverage over implant

Thin skin is a real problem for not only saline filled implants but gel filled implants as well. It seems that you had problem with palpability of your textured implant and your plastic surgeon attempted to correct the problem by inserting a gel filled implant. In most circumstances this is the correct thing to do. But if the skin is thin even a gel filled implant can cause a problem. There are a few solutions to correct this visualzation of the implant. A material called Alloderm... more