Adella Matthew Is On The Advisory Panel At The Breast Implant Centre At The BC Women’s Hospital In Vancouver

From: Richard and Adella Matthew adellaem@shaw.ca

To: delphine1939@videotron.ca

Implant Awareness Society

Phone: (604) 572-8486

We would like to thank Adella for the first installment of the Implant Awareness Society page. If you have access to a computer it is worthwhile to check out their websites and the other two websites mentioned. All are excellent. (quoted from the winter 1999 newsletter of the Breast Implant Centre at the BC Women’s Hospital in Vancouver)

Dear Silicone Sisters,

All silicone and saline breast implants have been placed in CLASS III of the FDA regulations. Class III is the category for items that have not been proven safe. The plastic surgeons have been spending millions, yes millions, to lobby the US Congress to have them moved into Class II. They have been unsuccessful to date.

The 51-page report to Congress on The FDA’s Regulation Of Silicone Breast Implants in December 1992 outlines this Class III category on pages 4, 10, and 49.

Delays have been going on since June 1988 when the FDA first asked the manufacturers to prove safety. No proof of safety has been submitted, and the manufacturers have refused to acknowledge any research proving silicone gel and saline implants to be detrimental to health. The date for the submission of proof of safety to the FDA keeps getting extended, now the final date on saline is November 17, 1999, a wait of over 10 years. Silicone gel is off the market except for special registered cases.

Dr. Diana M. Zuckerman, Ph.D., initiated the congressional report. I was very excited to have personal contact with her three times in October 1999. Dr. Zuckerman, is mentioned in the report on page ii of the introductory pages. She is the Executive Director of a website:

It is very worthwhile to check out her website.

On her website she states: the FDA recently received approval to seek medical records for more than 150 implant patients who received court settlements based on their diagnosis of scleroderma. If the FDA agrees with the court-approved diagnosis, this would represent many more patients than would normally be expected since scleroderma is an extremely rare disease. The manufacturers did not want the FDA to have access to these medical records. Do they have something to hide?

The IOM report is there; she explains the medical terms simply and points out the positive parts of the report as well as the negative comparisons such as, "defined connective tissue disease". She made special mention that, "the IOM report does not conclude that breast implants are safe" and that "mastectomy patients who have breast implants have 30-40% more complications than cosmetic patients". McGhan reported that more than 20% of the mastectomy implant patients have an implant removed within two years, as do 30% after four years. "Multiple surgeries are even more common", states the same report.

Under a report, How Much Information Is Enough, she states there is a proverb in medical science that "If you haven’t proven a product is harmful, that doesn’t mean you have proven it safe." It would make sense to study those women who believe they became seriously ill after their implants broke to see if they are more likely to have autoimmune or other diseases, but that has never been done.

You may want to order a free book from the FDA. Put the order ON A POSTCARD, not in a letter, to Breast Implants, FDA HFE-88, Rockville, MD 20857 asking for Information on Saline Breast Implants, Update, 1998. This book states on page 15, "recommended removal of all gel-filled implants preferably before 8 years of implantation" Many women have gel implants that far exceed 8 years.

Earlier this year, the Implant Awareness Society was invited to join Quebec’s large website:

We are very proud to have accepted. We call ourselves The Canadian Connection. Our documentation starts with the index:

Dr. Pierre Blais says we have the most important website in the world. We get over 50,000 hits per month as do General Motors. We passed Chrysler Motors 2 months ago. We average 27 different visiting countries a month as well as the US and Canadian governments.

The Implant Awareness Society is looking for some volunteers. If you would like to be part of a great team that is now having some world acclaim, please give me a call. I invite all enquiries.

Sincerely,

Adella Matthew

President