[Are foreign body calcifications late reactions following augmentation mammaplasty?]

We describe 47 patients aged 20 to 63 years in whom a mammaplasty had been performed (43 by an injection method, four by surgery). Calcification round the foreign body occurred in 71.5% of the paraffin group (ten out of 14 cases) and in 17% of the silicone group (eight out of 33 cases). The interval between implantation and calcification is fairly constant in the paraffin group; of 11 patients whose implant was older than 15 years, ten showed calcification. In the silicone group, only one out of ten cases showed calcification. In the silicone group, the material itself is thought to be responsible since (with the exception of one case done in 1956) all cases treated between 1966 and 1971 showed calcification irrespective of the interval.