Thursday, January 31, 2008 - 11:08 AM
13806

Removal of Extruded Silicone from Ruptured Breast Implants with High Pressure Parallel Waterjet

Guy Cappuccino, MD, Mark S. Granick, MD, Marek K. Dobke, MD, PhD, Charles K. Lee, MD, James J. Chao, MD, and Mayer Tenenhaus, MD.

Removal of free silicone gel from ruptured breast implants is necessary to avoid potential complications of inflammation, scarring and pain. Unfortunately removing the free silicone gel has been notoriously difficult and in our opinion, none of the traditional methods are adequate. A high powered parallel waterjet debridement tool recently made available for wound debridement has demonstrated promise in providing a quick, complete, and safe method of silicone gel removal. In our pilot study the Versajet® (Smith & Nephew, Largo, FL) effected complete removal of intracapsular extruded silicone gel in approximately 40% of the time required with conventional mechanical methods.