Although you may be more than satisfied with the results of your breast augmentation procedure, you may still wonder about the lifespan of the implants, since they will eventually degrade with time. Despite having performed thousands of successful breast augmentation procedures over the course of his career, Dr. Paul Pin still has patients who want to know how long their implants will last, how they will know when it might be time to remove them, and what steps will need to be taken if they do need to be removed.

How Long Will Breast Implants Last?

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which is the government body that oversees the safe manufacture of drugs and medical devices (including breast implants) recommends removing standard silicon gel implants after anywhere from 10 to 15 years and saline implants after anywhere from five to 10 years. There is not yet enough available data on the potential failure rate for the newer cohesive gel (gummy bear) breast implants for the FDA to have a solid recommendation on their lifespan. However, initial research seems to indicate a longer lifespan than that of silicone gel implants.

That being said, most plastic surgeons (including Dr. Pin) will recommend not automatically having breast implants removed according to the FDA timeline. As long as you are not having any issues with your implants, it makes little sense to go through the expense, risk, and recovery time of another surgery to either remove or swap out the implants unless you were looking to change implant size, material, or placement.

Signs that Breast Implants Need Replacing

As noted above, there may be aesthetic reasons why you wish to replace your breast implants. You might want to go from saline to silicone gel implants, or to change out older silicone implants for the newer cohesive gel ones. You can also change implant size, profile (the height of the implant compared to its width), or placement (either behind the mammary ducts and glands or the pectoral muscles of the chest).

However, the most common medically necessary reason for removing or replacing breast implants is due to leakage or rupture. In the case of saline implants, this will be rather immediately obvious, as the saline will be quickly reabsorbed back into the body and the affected breast will deflate back to its size before augmentation. It can be somewhat more difficult to detect leakage or rupture with a silicone gel implant, as the gel is not reabsorbed into the body. However, if the breast begins to feel hard, sore, or painful, Dr. Pin recommends undergoing an MRI every 10 years for silicone implants to see if there has been any change, leakage, or rupture. As noted previously, this is less of an issue with the newer, cohesive gel implants.

The truth is that implant failure is very rare, ranging from approximately 10% for saline implants to 1% for cohesive gel ones. The upshot of this is that odds are very good that your breast implants will have a long lifespan without causing you any problems whatsoever.