Is fat grafting for breast reconstruction in breast cancer patients safe?

Diagnosed with pancreatic cancer last year and underwent surgery.

I met many female cancer patients while recovering during a month and a half stay at a convalescent hospital.

As expected, since it is a women’s cancer specialty convalescent hospital, the most common patients are those with breast cancer, followed by uterine cancer, and then

There have been patients with gallbladder cancer, colon cancer, stomach cancer, liver cancer, and so on.

 

Many of the people who shared a room with me were also breast cancer patients.

And for those undergoing breast cancer surgery, if luck is on their side, they can have reconstruction surgery performed at the same time as the operation.

They do come, but if this doesn't align with the plastic surgery schedule during breast cancer surgery,

There are many cases where a second reconstructive surgery needs to be scheduled and performed.

Some people are postponing reconstructive surgery because it's difficult to endure the painful surgery time under general anesthesia again.

 

But the human body is truly mysterious..

Due to the absence of one breast, body imbalance causes back pain, shoulder pain, and other discomforts.

It causes a lot of pain.

Even if a person has a small chest, they tend to lean to one side because one side is missing.

So, I decided to undergo reconstructive surgery for the sake of restoring my body's balance.

 

 

Breast reconstruction surgery is mainly divided into methods using autologous tissue and methods using tissue expanders and breast implants. Autologous tissue reconstruction involves transplanting one's own abdominal or back fat into the empty chest area after breast cancer removal to restore volume. When there is a high likelihood of future radiation therapy, autologous tissue-based breast reconstruction is considered the first option.

 

If it is difficult to use autologous tissue or if a large amount of skin is preserved after mastectomy, breast reconstruction can be performed using tissue expanders and breast implants. While this method has the advantage of leaving no scars on the body, it requires multiple surgeries, and when tissue expanders or breast implants are in place, they can cause a firm, round capsule formation that can be felt as a hard lump, which is an inconvenience.

 

 

It is said that fat grafting is a very widely used method to partially reconstruct the deformed shape using autologous tissue.

Fat grafting is a method where the fat is injected in a semi-liquid state through a syringe, making the procedure simple and quick, without the need for incisions, which reduces the likelihood of various side effects and leaves fewer scars, so it seems to be used quite frequently.

 

However, in animal experiment presentations (mainly published in basic science journals), there have been reports that adipose tissue stimulates cancer cells.

In human fat transfer surgery, what is actually injected into the recipient site are fat cells or preadipocytes.

Even if you hear that a 'stem cell fat graft' procedure is being performed and undergo the surgery, it is only about isolating and extracting adult stem cells and injecting them, not injecting pure stem cells.

However, the fat injected during animal experiments mentioned in basic scientific journals as stimulating cancer cells is adipose stem cells, so it cannot be directly applied to humans who have undergone fat grafting surgery to draw such a conclusion. Nevertheless, clinical studies are needed to determine whether it adversely affects cancer recurrence or progression.

 

So I was curious. Since there are acquaintances among those currently undergoing breast cancer surgery who are about to have reconstruction surgery,

I'm curious. How safe is fat grafting for breast reconstruction in breast cancer patients?

 

Honestly, after becoming a cancer patient myself... I realized I really didn't think much about cancer.

Of course, there was even less information because there were no cancer patients among my immediate family.

When I see breast cancer patients, I realize that breast cancer is truly diverse in its types and severity.

I think it's important to find out the information in advance.