If you don’t have breast cancer or know someone who has had it, feel free to skip this blog. But given 1 in 8 women get breast cancer, I don’t know many people who don’t know someone.
For those who have had breast cancer, some have had a nipple sparing mastectomy. But many women cannot save the nipple because the cancer is too large, too close to the nipple areola complex, and other reasons.
So when you lose the nipple, what do you do? We as plastic surgeons can create a new nipple areola complex. We do the nipple part with a local flap. The areola can be done with a skin graft, tattoo, or both.
We know many nipple areola reconstructions turn out great. But some do not. This varies with technical things like the thickness of your flap, how much fat you have, how much scar you have, and other variables like radiation. We can usually predict who may have a hard time. What happens with these patients is the recreated nipple loses its projection and flattens out with time.
And there are some women do not want to surgically recreate the nipple areola. They are tired of operations; they don’t mind how it looks; etc.
Is there a nonsurgical alternative? The answer is yes. Naturally impressive is a homegrown company started by a woman who had breast cancer. It is a silicone non surgical nipple areola “glue on” nipple. The impressive thing about it is it looks real, and particularly for women who need to match a non operated on breast, they really match it. I will write another blog on their methods, but I had a patient who used them, and it looks real. (Definitely passes the in-the-locker-room-changing test.)
I have no stock in this company. They are just a really good product which is not well known, and their current website does not do it justice. The cost runs about $350, and insurance does not cover it.** But each one lasts for a long time, you can swim and exercise in it, and it looks real.
**ADDENDUM: They have updated me with new information- The cost runs from $200 (bilateral basic) to $325 (Custom unilateral). It may be difficult to get full insurance coverage. (Medicare B will kick in some.)