The below question is answered by the Charleston breast surgeon, Dr. James Craigie.
I had TRAM flap reconstruction in 2006 with revision and a follow up surgery in six months later. Since then some shrinkage has occurred in the reconstructive side and I have a hollow area on the upper portion. Do I have options for more normal looking breast without the hollow area?
You potentially have many options to improve your reconstruction. No one solution is perfect for all situations, but some options include repositioning the flap to a higher location, augmenting the hollow area with your own fat grafts (taken usually from abdomen, thigh, or buttocks), or using any excess skin / fat from under your armpit as an additional flap to lift and augment the TRAM (we call this a 5th intercostal artery perforator flap). Some more aggressive options would include placing a small breast implant under the TRAM flap, or adding a whole new microvascular flap from another area, although this is rarely in practice necessary.
Hope this helps. Please feel free to email or call with any additional questions.
Dr. James Craigie
The Center for Natural Breast Reconstruction
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