There has recently been an increase in the use of fat grafting for the correction of congenital or acquired breast deformities and for aesthetic breast treatment. This increase is due to the emergence of novel fat grafting techniques that produce lasting and reliable results despite some authors' beliefs that the procedure might hinder breast cancer screening. This literature review aims to identify the most frequently used breast fat grafting techniques, evaluate their efficacy and safety, and report their major complications. The review was performed after a search in the PubMed and LILACS databases, and only English-language articles published over the past 5 years were assessed. There have been an increased number of studies on the topic in recent years, and a specific fat grafting technique has been primarily reported. Most studies in this area have shown that breast fat grafting does not affect radiological breast cancer screening, whereas some studies have suggested that the use of grafted fat may enhance the development of breast cancer. Despite the increased number of published studies, few have a good level of scientific evidence. This review concludes that fat grafting is an alternative technique for the correction of breast deformities and moderate aesthetic breast enlargement and should be performed by properly trained surgeons accompanied by a radiology team that is experienced in breast imaging. Further studies with appropriate scientific methodologies are needed to evaluate breast fat grafting.
Breast fat grafting; Fat graft
