Case Study: Gynecomastia Surgery

September 13, 2019

We’ve been performing gynecomastia surgery in Toronto for a long time now, and we perform a lot of them—as many as 200 in a single year. If this is the first you’re hearing of this condition and this operation, we thought a great way to learn more would be through a recent case study.

But first, let’s cover the basics.

What is gynecomastia?

Gynecomastia is a condition that affects a lot of men. When I say a lot, I mean between 40 and 60% of men at some point during their lives. It’s a condition where breast tissue becomes overdeveloped and, for the most part, we don’t know what causes it. It’s not associated with excess weight or hormonal imbalance.

Perhaps most frustrating, exercise and weight loss do not solve the problem. In fact, working out more and building pectoral muscle can sometimes make the condition appear pronounced as the extra volume of muscle causes the excess tissue to appear even larger.

It can have a big impact on our patients’ lives. I’ve met men who have felt self-conscious and embarrassed about the way they look their entire lives for something over which they have no control. They avoid situations where they might be more comfortable shirtless, or only wear loose-fitting clothing to try to hide their chests.

For those who want to change it, the only remedy for this condition is surgery.

Our Revolutionary Gynecomastia Surgery Technique

In the past, the only way surgeons were able to address a patient’s concerns in this regard was to make a relatively significant incision either around the nipple or across the whole chest. Unfortunately, that resulting scar somewhat defeated the purpose for men who wanted the confidence to walk around shirtless.

We wanted to help develop a technique to eliminate this visible scarring to give men the option of a totally natural looking result. If you look closely at this patient’s photos, you can see the very small incisions we now use below the nipple and slightly to the side of the chest. This patient is only a few weeks post-op, so his scars will continue to heal and fade as he recovers. Ultimately, they’ll be almost imperceptible and basically equivalent to the mark left after mole removal.

Through this tiny incision, we’re able to remove almost all of the excess glandular and fatty tissue from the chest. The result is a totally born-with-it look that doesn’t appear overdone and doesn’t have any telltale surgical scarring.

We’ve seen this surgery seriously change lives for our patients. We couldn’t be more proud to have contributed to the research about this operation with our pioneering peer reviewed article on the topic. Since 2008, it’s helped surgeons around the world learn how use our innovative method to achieve the best results possible.