The team behind this breast surgery comparison

Aesthetic surgery · breast and body contouring · the surgical decision

Dr. Tongchun Mao is Deputy Director of the Plastic Surgery & Aesthetics Medical Center and head of its aesthetic surgery service at Chongqing West District Hospital, and he is the physician responsible for this site. A core specialist formerly at the Plastic and Aesthetic Surgery Department of Xinqiao Hospital, affiliated with Army Medical University, he has rooted his clinical practice for more than 20 years and personally performs over 700 operations a year.

Breast surgery is the area where a patient is most often offered an operation before the finding has been named. Dr. Mao’s position, and the one this site is written around, is that position and volume are separate measurements: a lift repositions an envelope that has descended and adds nothing, an implant adds volume and repositions nothing, and a plan that treats the two as interchangeable will disappoint whichever patient it is applied to. He discusses the second operation — revision, exchange or removal — at the first appointment, on the grounds that a decision made without it is not yet a decision.

Clinical focus

• Breast lift, including full and limited-pattern lifts and their scar patterns
• Breast augmentation with silicone gel-filled or saline-filled implants, by class
• Breast augmentation with autologous fat transfer, including staged grafting
• Combined lift and augmentation plans, and the reasons some are staged instead
• Implant surveillance, exchange, removal and revision within the same centre

Academic roles & achievements

• Member, Rhinoplasty and Trunk Tumor Groups, Chinese Medical Association Plastic Surgery Branch
• Member, Chongqing Medical Aesthetics Quality Control Center; Member, Chongqing Medical Accident / Disability Assessment Expert Pools
• Deputy Chair, Chongqing Shapingba District Medical Aesthetics Committee
• Published 5 SCI papers, holds 7 national patents, and has participated in 4 research projects
• Repeatedly named an “Outstanding Young Physician” at Xinqiao Hospital since joining in 2005

Plastic surgery · complex cases · revision

Dr. Shaoliang Wang is Director of the Plastic Surgery & Aesthetics Medical Center at Chongqing West District Hospital, and previously served as Deputy Chief of Plastic and Aesthetic Surgery at Xinqiao Hospital, affiliated with Army Medical University. On this site he is the second opinion a breast that has already been operated on is brought to.

His part of the decision is the one patients rarely ask for: whether a second operation — a lift after an implant, an exchange, a removal with or without replacement, or the correction of a result that did not settle as planned — should proceed at all, and what a breast that has already been operated on can safely tolerate the second time. Because a revision carries added risk rather than removing the risk of the first operation, that judgement belongs in the plan for the first operation rather than in the years after it.

Clinical focus

• Revision and reconstruction after previous breast surgery
• Complex wound repair and tertiary-hospital surgical support
• Second opinions on plans proposed elsewhere

Skin & laser aesthetics · surgical aftercare

Dr. Ke He is Deputy Director of the Plastic Surgery & Aesthetics Medical Center and head of its skin and laser aesthetic service at Chongqing West District Hospital, with more than 20 years on the clinical front line. In this comparison her part is the skin: its quality and elasticity decide how a lifted breast holds its shape and how an implant-covered breast drapes, and the same skin carries whatever scar the operation requires.

Clinical focus

• Skin quality and elasticity assessment before breast surgery
• Scar prevention and scar management after breast surgery
• Non-surgical skin treatment and its honest limits

Dermatology · assessment and complication management

Dr. Yongbo Jia is Deputy Director of the Plastic Surgery & Aesthetics Medical Center and head of dermatology at Chongqing West District Hospital, trained at the Institute of Dermatology, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences. His part in this decision is the dermatological assessment that happens before an operation is planned, and the management of a breast that changes in a way surgery does not explain — a skin change, a rash, or a lump that needs a diagnosis in its own right rather than an operation.

Clinical focus

• Dermatological assessment before breast surgery
• Skin disease that affects surgical healing
• Assessment of breast skin changes and lumps as clinical questions