Every woman considering breast augmentation shares the same concern: How do I choose an implant that's the right size for me? Will the implants my doctor suggests create the look I desire?
Some doctors have a patent for a device that determines the best implant size to meet a patients request, its understandable that you will want to get some sense of how different options will look on you. Its for this reason that doctors use a state of the art digital breast imaging system: the Vectra 3D XT System.
What does Vectra simulation do?
After taking multiple simultaneous digital images of the breasts, the software creates a detailed 3-D image of your breasts. It makes careful measurements between key landmarks and quantifies differences in the shape and size of your two breasts. This will help draw your doctor's attention to problem areas he needs to take into consideration.
Most exciting is that the sophisticated computer algorithms can simulate the result that any of the hundreds of available implant shapes and sizes would create in you. You can compare size, profile, and shape. What will a teardrop highly cohesive implant look like? What about the softest round gel? It can do this and everything in between.
It can also simulate various sizes. How would one size bigger or smaller look? It is important to know that this is a tool. No computer is yet capable of considering all the variables. But you will get some sense of the shape a particular implant will create, and the proportion of that size relative to your body.
Imaging should not be used as a method to pick a size. Measurements and patient requests determine the size, and Vectra is used for you to visualize that result and perhaps decide between small differences in shape and size.
When breasts are only a little droopy, the newest software is able to simulate a lift, though it does not work if your breasts are so droopy that a camera cannot see all the way underneath them to capture the image. Of course, like any simulation, Vectra 3D imaging is not perfect, but it gives an excellent approximation. Sometimes that approximation is spot on, and other times it is not. But doctors have found it to be far and away the most helpful forecasting tool available and patients agree. Many say that the digital imaging played a big role in giving them confidence that their implant choice will give them the result they desire.
