Smoking Can Make Nipples Fall Off, Warns Plastic Surgeon

Women with breast implants who smoke, beware.

A top plastic surgeon's warns on CNN's health blog The Chart that not kicking that nicotine habit before and after surgery could lead to your nipples falling off.

Dr. Anthony Youn elaborates on that very scenario as told in his new memoir, In Stiches. To salvage a patient's nipples, leeches were applied to suck out old blood.

Purple is the precursor to black. Black is the precursor to falling off. To save the patient - and her nipples - we turned to the only treatment available. We went medieval. We used leeches.

So how exactly does this happen? The Daily Mail explains that the nicotine and carbon monoxide inhaled from a cigarette can constrict the blood flow to various parts of the body. This disrupts the patient's healing process of a body part by stopping blood from reaching it.

Youn, who hails from Detroit, Michigan, explains this only applies to patients who went under the knife to perk up their breasts, not just any smoker.

Nevertheless, whether or not smokers are opting for a breast lift or not, the lethal effects of smoking are well documented. The CDC writes on its website:

More deaths are caused each year by tobacco use than by all deaths from human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), illegal drug use, alcohol use, motor vehicle injuries, suicides, and murders combined. Smoking causes an estimated 90% of all lung cancer deaths in men and 80% of all lung cancer deaths in women. An estimated 90% of all deaths from chronic obstructive lung disease are caused by smoking.

Comments

[jonbgoode]

03:30 AM on 12/16/2011

Dang ! I thought only -60 below weather at Prudhoe Bay did that

[samanthadoors]

02:24 AM on 12/09/2011

Thanks for the video, I hope this would help a lot of people to quit in their smoking vices.

plastic surgeons Philippines
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[aonorat]

09:31 PM on 12/08/2011

Makes me think about a great ad to make most men quit smoking and I am not talking about their nipples.

[dakotanprudle]

07:27 PM on 12/08/2011

Thank goodness mine are real!

[satyrday]

10:58 AM on 12/08/2011

Sounds like the perfect warning on a cigarette pack.

[majesticjkr]

09:34 AM on 12/08/2011

we all know the harm smoking does to people and people around people that smoke, will it change the way we think about smoking, NO, smokers wont stop unless they want to stop, its a terrible addiction, smokers know how junkies feel when they havent got anything to smoke, its an addiction and week people are addicted to it, not eveyone gets addicted to things, there are some that can start and stop almost anything, but most people are week minded and would rather have it than go without, people in power who give off the big I am stong, without a smoke they crumble just like junkies without a fix, its know way to live is it,

[wyndchas78]

08:04 PM on 12/07/2011

Now does this happen with the procedure of going through the armpit or is it just the one that partially removes the nipple?

[ForVivi]

01:30 AM on 12/09/2011

Either way, just don't do it!

[wyndchas78]

08:00 AM on 12/09/2011

The surgery or smoking? Cause I'm thinking don't do either.

[jstagynjax]

05:54 PM on 12/07/2011

BWAH HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!! !! !! !! !! (ROFLMFAO!! !!) At first I thought this was a gag. I'm glad I actually read it.

[FlowerGypsy]

01:06 PM on 12/07/2011

Smoking is just gross. I've seen what it does to people. It makes you cough and hack all day long and your skin starts getting saggy in your early 40's. No thanks!

[sensimilla]

12:05 PM on 12/07/2011

I'm so happy i quit, smoking cancer sticks is DISGUSTING!

[susanbsbi]

10:16 AM on 12/07/2011

I smoke, but before any surgery, i go on the patch and for 10 days after wards. It does effect you blood flow. Oh I have just had a Chest Cat scan and my lungs are clear. Any body who smokes needs to have a yearly chest x-ray.

[Robert Goetz]

04:45 AM on 12/07/2011

Sounds like the old wives tale about masturbation and going blind.

[dpgaff]

12:14 AM on 12/07/2011

Too Funny. Couldn't be the pressure from the Mae Wests cutting off the circulation could it? LOL By the way, carbon monoxide is a product from burning fossil fuels. Carbon dioxide is a product from burning organic matter. Tobacco is organic matter. It is a leaf.

[Jane McCallion]

10:20 AM on 12/07/2011

Carbon monoxide is a part of any smoke - it's what kills most people in house fires, particularly if they happen at night. It's a well documented component of tobacco smoke too, along with carbon dioxide and myriad other things.

As regards fossil fuels, they are organic material as well (former trees, former microscopic sea creatures etc). They may have a higher CO:CO2 per tonne ratio than fresh organic matter (although I don't know if this is true), but that doesn't change the fact that both give off both when burnt.

[dpgaff]

11:55 AM on 12/07/2011

Do they pay you to say things like that?

[p47nandmosquito]

12:42 PM on 12/07/2011

Carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide are both products of the combustion of carbon in air. Carbon monoxide occurs when there is insufficient oxygen to form carbon dioxide, as happens part of the time in any normal combustion of carbon, and carbon makes up large portions of all organic molecules (actually that's the technical definition of an organic molecule), because it is common, bonds strongly, and usually bonds to 4 other atoms, which is high. The equations are 2C + O_2 -> 2CO and C + O_2 -> CO_2. Of course, the fact is, fossil fuels are organic matter, they're just old organic matter that's been under heat and pressure for a while, but if you look at any fat, it's made up of hydrocarbon chains, which are exactly what fossil fuels are, except coal which is just carbon.

[whats in the water]

11:02 PM on 12/06/2011

THIS SOUNDS LIKE A GREAT TITLE FOR A COUNTRY MUSIC SONG SMOKING MAKES YOUR NIPPLES FALL OFF.I KNOW THIS IS NOT SUPPOSE TO BE FUNNY BUT HOW CAN YOU NOT LAUGH AT THE HEADLINE

[Just Dance]

10:07 PM on 12/06/2011

Well, that's something that can't be said for a lot of addictions...