Dr. Lisa Cassileth is a breast surgeon in Beverly Hills, which, according to her, means encountering “so many bad boob jobs.” But repairing someone else’s questionable handiwork happens to be one of Dr. Cassileth’s specialties, along with innovative reconstructions and other thoughtful surgical developments that prioritize positive patient outcomes and well-being. Dr. Cassileth was the first female chief of plastic surgery at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center and has started two practices of her own. 

“Women aren’t really getting breast reductions as much as they used to,” Dr. Cassileth tells Jessica Cruel, host of the Perspectives podcast and editor in chief of Allure. That’s largely due to the impact of GLP-1s. “[Patients are] getting breast lifts because after the weight is lost…it’s really now a skin problem.” Breast lifts are aided by an absorbable mesh, which can hold the breast in place while scar tissue and collagen forms to support the newly tightened skin. 

Dr. Cassileth discusses this and other trends and technological developments in the breast surgery space, including improved implants, fat transfers for augmentations, the use of peptides for expedited recovery, and the influence of AI. Her office uses AI-enhanced modeling to preview surgical outcomes, but Dr. Cassileth and other cosmetic and medical providers are also facing the reality that patients’ expectations are being skewed by AI-generated images. “Even though I’m a plastic surgeon,” Dr. Cassileth says, “and I have a lot of tools at my disposal, not even natural humans can achieve what AI is achieving.” 

Still, a lot can be achieved. Dr. Cassileth talks through the essential steps for safe and sterile breast reconstruction or augmentation, and explains why patients seeking breast reductions are her favorite to work with. She also details the expectations she has for mastectomy surgeons in hospitals, calling out high rates of mastectomy flap necrosis, which happens when skin tissue dies due to lack of blood flow, complicating reconstructions. “You can have plastic surgeons that are fantastic, but if the mastectomy surgeon who removes the breast tissue is still making a big line, or if the overlying skin dies at the time they do the mastectomy, because the skin is thinned out too much, then,” Dr. Cassileth asks, “how does a plastic surgeon do a good job?” 

Perspectives is a new series exploring the topics that shape women's lives today with honest, nuanced, and deeply personal conversations. The first season examines the cultural significance of breasts through intimate accounts and expert interviews, hosted by Allure’s editor in chief Jessica Cruel.

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Ericka Hart is in the next phase of her lifelong sex education. Starting as a curious and resourceful teenager, looking for answers to supplement her abstinence-only sex-ed class, Hart built on her knowledge when she was diagnosed, at 28, with breast cancer. Until her diagnosis, Hart had never really thought about her breasts. “They really felt like they were in service to other people,” she says. That changed post-treatment when she went topless at a music festival in 2016, publicly displaying her mastectomy scars: “I just wanted people…to see me and my scars, and to see what breast cancer looks like in Black, queer, and trans people.” She also wanted to challenge the cultural default that desexualizes cancer survivors. People would tell Hart over and over that she was so inspiring, which was nice, but, she adds, “I’m also pretty hot.” 

That next phase of her education arrived when she got pregnant with her partner using IUI (intrauterine insemination) and gave birth. “I feel much different in my body now as a 40-year-old who is three years postpartum than I did after breast cancer,” Hart says. “I think pregnancy and childbirth truly rocked me more than anything I’ve ever experienced.” Now that she’s raising a child, Hart is aware of another change—the feeling that she wants to keep her body to herself, asking, “What’s for me?” 

Ericka Hart is a sex educator, activist, and the author of Nasty Work. 

Allure’s Perspectives is a new series exploring the topics shaping women's lives today through honest, nuanced, and deeply personal conversations. The first season examines the cultural significance of breasts through intimate accounts and expert interviews, hosted by editor in chief Jessica Cruel.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You can’t talk about breasts without talking about bras. So Jessica Cruel, Allure’s editor in chief, went to the source: Dr. Valerie Steele, director and chief curator of the Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City. Dr. Steele is a pioneer in the field of fashion studies and that the clothes we wear–and what we wear underneath them–merit serious attention. She’s also the author of a book tracing the cultural history of the corset and how it influenced the development of other shapewear. Cue: the bra.

Bras started to show up in the early 20th century as more women joined the workforce and pursued activities that required a broader range of movement and support. From torpedo-like bras to padded bras to more gamine bralettes, they are, according to Dr. Steele, “always in relation to the style of dress” that’s popular at the time and often attempt to balance looking “respectable” with being “sexually attractive.” Women, Dr. Steele notes, have always sought some form of shapewear, even if it's a rejection of the structure (e.g., bra-burning in the '70s). Today, as bra designers focus on balancing comfort with style, Dr. Steele highlights how there is still an impulse to nip, tuck, cinch, and lift the body.

Allure’s Perspectives is a new series exploring the topics shaping women's lives today through honest, nuanced, and deeply personal conversations. The first season examines the cultural significance of breasts through intimate accounts and expert interviews, hosted by editor in chief Jessica Cruel.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Actor Olivia Munn is no stranger to the spotlight, but in recent years, after the birth of her first child and a breast cancer diagnosis, things have looked a little different for her—a reality Munn is bravely leaning into. “When I get asked about any part of my health journey,” Munn tells Allure’s editor in chief Jessica Cruel, “it feels like I have purpose now.” 

Munn walks Cruel through the physical and emotional challenges that came with the joys of her new motherhood. Munn was determined to breastfeed her son, Malcolm, but after working with multiple lactation consultants and trying acupuncture, supplements, and meditation, she turned to formula. Munn says she had “all of this guilt that ‘breast is best,’” adding that “breast milk is amazing, but that slogan is so difficult for women like myself.” She also wrestled with postpartum anxiety and its physical symptoms—waking up in the middle of the night, chest tight, heart racing—that soon did something “strange” to her brain, intensifying the loss of identity she felt during her postpartum break and financial anxiety about being out of the workforce.

Two years later, at the urging of her doctor, Munn took the lifetime risk assessment test for breast cancer, and received a high score. After more testing, Munn was diagnosed with bilateral luminal B breast cancer. She’s had five surgeries since then, including a double mastectomy and reconstruction, and an operation to remove her uterus, ovaries, and fallopian tubes to reduce the risk of recurrence. “One question I have been asked,” Munn recalls, “is did I ever feel that my body was betraying me. That doesn’t make sense,” she says, because “my body is the thing getting me through this.” 

Breast Cancer Risk Assessment Tool can be found here.

Allure’s Perspectives is a new series exploring the topics shaping women's lives today through honest, nuanced, and deeply personal conversations. The first season examines the cultural significance of breasts through intimate accounts and expert interviews, hosted by editor in chief Jessica Cruel.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The inaugural season of Allure Perspectives will explore one of the most controversial and medically researched parts of a woman’s body: breasts. Through expert interviews, personal stories, and historical context, the series, hosted by editor in chief Jessica Cruel, will examine how breasts intersect with beauty, health, identity, sexuality, and culture.

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