The idea of fat grafting to the breast came to the forefront of aesthetic and reconstructive surgery has taken more than a century. Breast augmentation was performed using fatty tissue harvested from a lymphoma in the patient’s lumbar area in 1895. Using antilogous fat to enhance or reconstruct the breast has historically caused controversy.
The use of antilogous transplanted fat in the breast was controversial as are many new techniques. The fat harvested by liposuction (which was developed in the early 1980’s) for reinjection was first utilized by aesthetic surgeons for breast augmentation. The subcutaneous tissues could be infiltrated to correct facial and body contours led to an efficient method of harvesting fat cells.
Contemporary studies clearly proved correct the speculation by surgeons that fat grafting caused calcification of the breast. In the mid-1980’s the idea that transplanted fat might die, creating scarring and calcification raised concerns voiced by the American Society of Plastic Surgeons.
Scarring and calcification of the breast can be the result of any breast surgery (breast enlargement surgery via implants, breast biopsy, reduction mammaplasty, breast biopsy, traditional breast reconstruction with flaps, etc.) In actuality the authors felt that radiologists displayed confidence in differentiating between benign postoperative changes and those representing carcinoma of the breast.





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