In
My Quest for Beauty
Silicone Breast Implants:
My 22-year Nightmare
1st
edition by Fran Stiff
Size 210mm X 148mm;
8
pages b/w and colour pics; Trade softcover;
ISBN
0958-4611-12 Non fiction
FRAN
STIFF is
a silicone gel survivor. Implanted with silicone
gel-filled breast implants in November 1981 she was told
it was a ‘‘one off’’ and that the implants would
last a lifetime. It was the beginning of a 22-year
nightmare. Intended to enhance her beauty, the procedure
had the opposite result. By 1983 her right breast had
become hard and deformed. The implant had ruptured and
loose silicone gel had been broadcast into her breast and
other body tissues. This was surgically removed and the
implant replaced.
By
May 1989 her right breast had re-hardened, but at this
time she was unable to find a plastic surgeon to deal with
it. They were only prepared to explant the implants,
because they said the hardening would only reoccur. This
would have left her with a grossly deformed chest and no
breasts. She refused, deciding it was preferable to live
with the deformity. She found herself progressively
afflicted with major allergies. It was only in 1997 — 16
years after the first implantations — that she found a
plastic surgeon who was prepared to tackle her problems.
After a string of operations to remove remnants of
silicone gel remaining in her body and the replacement of
both her implants with saline-filled ones, Fran is at last
at the stage she had thought she had reached in 1981. Even
her silicone gel-inspired allergies have also begun to
diminish.
While
silicone gel implants have been banned in the USA since
1992, their virtually unregulated use has continued in the
European Union, South Africa and elsewhere. Effectively,
women there have been used as lab rats by silicone gel
breast implants manufacturers to gather data for the FDA
that will get silicone gel breast implants back on the
lucrative US market.
A
large body of medical opinion insists that implanted
silicone gel causes no harm, others like the influential
US Institute of Medicine say the jury is still out. But
ignoring the academics, what about the 440 000 implanted
women who took civil action against Dow Corning Corp —
whose selfsame silicone gel was being used not only used
in breast implants but as transformer coolant and as
waterproofing for the electronic parts of submarines?
Those silent witnesses certainly believe that it is
harmful. Surely they can’t all be wrong?
|
|
An intact fibrous capsule that
formed
around a silicone gel-filled implant.
|
Capsule opened to reveal a
rupture
of the silicone gel-filled implant and
the leakage
of gel into the capsule
|
|
|
Demonstrating the stickiness
and greasy
appearance of the leaked silicone gel.
|
The chalky calcified foreign
body reaction to leaking
silicone gel-filled implants.
This is similar to what was
explanted from Fran's right
breast.
|
....
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