Breast implants may not cause cancer, but a study of Swedish women who have had implants for cosmetic reasons shows that they are linked to higher incidences of drug abuse and suicide. Study leader urges psychiatric screening for prospective patients.

According to the August, 2007 issue of the Annals of Plastic Surgery, a study of women in Sweden is pointing to a link between cosmetic breast enlargement and psychiatric disorders, including being three times more likely to commit suicide, as compared to women in the general population, and the doctor in charge, Loren Lipworth of the International Epidemiology in Rockville, MD and the Vanderbilt University Medical Center, in Tennessee is urging plastic surgeons to institute pre-surgery mental health screenings, and post-surgery mental-health follow-ups with their patients.

Lipworth's study is not the first to make the connection between implants and suicide impulses, but it is the most expansive, following on the heels of an earlier project that studied around 3500 Swedish women who had cosmetic breast implants between 1965 and 1993. Using information from national health care records, Lipworth and her colleagues compared the number and causes of deaths among women who had implants and women in the same age group who did not, with a mean follow-up period of 18.7 years post surgery.

According to the Lipworth study, "At least 38 deaths (22 per cent of all deaths) in this implant cohort were associated with suicide, psychologic disorders, and/or drug and alcohol abuse/dependence."

The researchers concluded that there is a significant connection between cosmetic breast implants and alcohol abuse, drug dependency, and suicide, and believe that prospective recipients of implants should undergo thorough psychiatric counseling and after-care.