Breast Reduction

Breast Reduction, also called a Reduction Mammoplasty is a surgical procedure that reduces and reshapes your breasts, re-positioning the nipple to give a more youthful look and natural shape. Unlike women with small breasts who can often choose to wear a padded bra, you cannot make your breasts smaller without surgery. Women with large heavy breasts often consider this procedure for some of the following reasons:

            Backache and Neck pain

            Lack of confidence and self esteem due to breast shape and size

            Difficulty participating in some sports or physical activity

            Painful indentations on the shoulders caused by bra straps

            Discomfort and rashes from perspiration underneath the breast

Choosing to have a breast reduction can have a truly positive impact on many aspects of your life. Aside from making you feel more comfortable going about your day to day life, you should feel amazing after surgery with the flexibility to choose your clothes including underwear and swimwear in a completely new light.  On top of that, your body confidence should have an almighty surge. 

What is involved in the procedure?

Once you have decided that surgery is the right path for you, we will arrange a date for surgery that suits you.  The breast reduction procedure involves removing excess tissue and skin from the breast and re-positioning the nipple to reshape the breast in the most natural way.  You will usually have a scar around the nipple, a vertical scar running down from the bottom of the nipple to the fold beneath the breast and finally a scar along the bottom fold of the breast. Your operation will take around 2 ½ hours and is performed under general anaesthetic, so you will sleep throughout the entire operation.  Dressings are applied once the surgery is finished and you will need to wear a soft supportive sports style bra for 6 weeks.  After surgery, you will generally need to stay in hospital for 1 night to ensure you feel well rested and pain free before going home.

Time to Recover

During the first week of recovery, you will need to take plenty of rest and limit movement to allow your body to heal.  You will probably need to take 2 weeks off work, or your normal busy routine to help recovery.  After one week, you will return to hospital to have your dressings changed.  After surgery, you will need to take it easy for up to 4-6 weeks, depending how well you have healed and how you feel.  After this time, you can expect to return to your normal routines, including gentle exercise.  Full aerobic exercise can normally be resumed after 6 weeks.

Breast reductions have an extremely positive reaction from patients who undergo the surgery.  The surgery can really change the way that you are able to live your life.  Extremely large breasts can often debilitate you and having the reduction will not only improve your self-confidence and well being, but also enable you to live your life to the full.