For decades, breast augmentation has been among the top three cosmetic procedures in the United States, helping millions of people reach their body-shape goals. In 2024 alone, more than 300,000 breast augmentation procedures were performed in the US.
If you feel like Mother Nature came up short with your breast size and you’d like to explore breast augmentation, you’ve come to the right place.
In the following, McHugh Plastic Surgery’s own Dr. Thomas McHugh reviews five of the more common questions we get about breast augmentation to help guide you.
This is the leading question we get about breast augmentation surgery. Let’s look at the difference between the two.
Silicone implants contain silicone adhesive gel (much like a gummy bear). They are far and away the more popular option because they:
Saline implants, on the other hand, feature silicone shells that we fill with sterilized water. They also have some benefits, such as smaller implantation incisions and easier removal.
During your consultation, we can review your goals and help you decide between the different implants so that you make a choice that's best for you.
In most cases, we perform breast augmentation on an outpatient basis, which means you can go home the same day. That said, we use general anesthesia, so you’ll need to take it easy.
In fact, we want you to take it easy for the first week so that you can recover well. We supply you with support garments that you should wear during this time and we want you to follow our postoperative instructions carefully.
In most cases, our patients are back to work after a week or two, but you might have to deal with some lingering soreness. After a few weeks, we’ll monitor you and greenlight you for more activity as you progress.
After 3-4 weeks, you should be back to business as usual, except you’ll be showing off your new-and-improved profile!
Breast implants don’t lift sagging breasts; they only increase their size. If you want to reverse sagging breasts, explore our popular breast lift procedure.
There are a few risks associated with breast implants, such as:
This list isn’t complete, and we’ll go over your risks in more detail when we sit down with you.
Immediately after your breast augmentation, you might experience some loss of sensation around your nipples. This sensation typically returns as your body heals and adjusts to the new size of your breasts, which is usually about 3-6 months.
While these questions are a good start, we understand that you might have more. To learn more about breast augmentation, come sit down with Dr. McHugh for a consultation. To set that up, contact our office in The Woodlands, Texas, to schedule an appointment.
