EVALUATION OF THE INTRACAPSULAR RUPTURE OF SILICONE BREAST IMPLANTS BY MAGNETIC RESONANCE IMAGING IN ASYMPTOMATIC PATIENTS AND CORRELATION WITH SURGICAL FINDINGS

The true incidence of implant rupture is very difficult to establish. Frequently implant rupture is asymptomatic because the free silicone remains within the fibrous capsule surrounding the implant. Therefore, the identification of rupture is based only on the use of imaging techniques. The aim of this study IS to evaluate the effectiveness magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in the detection of breast implant rupture and to correlate imaging findings with surgical ones. Patients were 73 women between 30 and 69 years. By MRI we found 20 intracapsular ruptures, no one extracapsular rupture, 53 normal implants. The most important findings at surgery were the 20 intracapsular ruptures that were previously diagnosed at MRI. In this study we found that magnetic resonance imaging diagnosed intracapsular rupture with a high sensitivity and an even higher specificity.