Capsular contracture with textured versus smooth saline-filled implants for breast augmentation: a prospective clinical study.

Texturization of silicone-filled breast implants has been shown to reduce the incidence of capsular contracture. A double-blind clinical study was undertaken to compare this incidence in saline-filled implants with textured or with smooth surfaces. Twenty-one women underwent mammary augmentation with a textured implant in one breast and a smooth implant in the other. The implants were placed subglandularly. All operations were performed by the same surgeon and all follow-up examinations by another. Breast hardness was evaluated 6 months postoperatively with applanation tonometry, using Baker's grading, and after 12 months, now also with a questionnaire concerning the patient's evaluation. Capsular contracture (Baker 3) had occurred in 33 percent of the breasts at the end of the study, and was bilateral in five cases. The incidence of contracture and the patients' views on the results did not differ between textured and smooth prostheses or between right and left breasts. Five patients requested reoperation, two of them because of breast hardness. Texturization of saline-filled implants thus did not reduce the incidence of capsular contracture.