Kazan doctors rebuild Kamchatka woman's breast without implant

Doctors at the Republican Oncology Dispensary in Kazan have reconstructed a patient's breast using microsurgical technologies, Tatarstan's Health Minister Almir Abashev announced.

The 42-year-old woman from Kamchatka underwent several reconstruction stages after cancer treatment and the removal of her right breast. Due to individual characteristics of her body, neither an implant nor a special tissue expander took hold.

Doctors performed the operation using DIEP reconstruction, a method that avoids implants by using the patient's own tissue taken from the lower abdomen. Skin and fatty tissue, along with feeding blood vessels, were moved to the site of the removed breast and the vessels were joined under a microscope, said Irina Ovchinnikova, an oncologist in the mammology and reconstructive plastic surgery department.