Study Says Implants Double Risk of Infection After Breast Reconstructive Surgery

Breast cancer patients who had reconstructive surgery using implants immediately after mastectomies were twice as likely to acquire infections as women who immediately had breast reconstruction using their own tissue, according to a study published yesterday.

The article in Archives of Surgery, which examined the medical records of breast surgery patients at Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis from mid-1999 to mid-2002, found that 50 of 949 patients acquired an infection at the surgical site within a year after surgery.

Roughly 12 percent of the infections occurred in mastectomy patients who immediately had implant surgery, compared with roughly 6 percent of infections in those who immediately had breast reconstruction using their own abdominal tissue, the study said. In noncancer patients, about 1 percent of infections occurred after breast reductions and no infections occurred after breast augmentation using implants, the study said.

''The bottom line is that implants are associated with an increased risk of infection in breast cancer patients,'' said Margaret A. Olsen, the lead author of the study and a research assistant professor of medicine at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. ''The question is what factors contribute to this increased risk and what can be done to prevent it?''

Dr. Keith E. Brandt, a professor of plastic and reconstructive surgery at Washington University and an author of the study, said all patients received prophylactic antibiotics at the time of surgery. But postsurgical treatments for breast cancer, like radiation, may weaken the body's ability to fight infection...

•	Study Says Implants Double Risk of Infection After Breast Reconstructive Surgery The New York Times, Tuesday, Jan. 22, 2008 Byline: Natasha Singer

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