Everything You Need to Know About Gummy Bear Implants

If you’ve been confused upon seeing the term gummy bear breast implants popping up on social media recently, you’re not alone. As with many trends, what’s old is new again. “Wow, are we still using the term gummy bear implants? That term was popular many years ago and has become more confusing over time,” Louisville, KY plastic surgeon M. Bradley Calobrace, MD says when I ask him about the re-emerging term.

Implant offerings have evolved a lot since the last time this term was trending, which can make things complicated. The main point of confusion is that all implants are a spectrum with no specific cutoff for when they’re technically considered gummy bear or otherwise.

Ultimately, the kind of implant you get should depend on what you and your doctor decide is best suited to meet your goals, not what’s trending online. But to get a better understanding of the re-emerged term, we asked experts to explain the gummy bear breast implant.

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What are gummy bear breast implants?

“Gummy bear breast implants are implants with a highly cohesive gel, not as stiff as a gummy bear candy but stiffer than commonly used gels,” explains Eugene, OR plastic surgeon Mark Jewell, MD. The term is fairly passé when it comes to doctors as it’s an older term, but it seems to be making a recurrence with social media and aesthetic trends.

While all silicone implants offered in the United States have cohesive gel, the gummy bear implant tends to refer to those with the most cohesive gel, making them firmer than their softer counterparts with less cohesive gel, explains Pittsburgh, PA plastic surgeon Jeffrey Antimarino, MD. “As of now, in the United States, all implants sold are currently some level of gummy bear implant,” say Tucson plastic surgeons Dr. Silvia Kurtovic and Dr. Raman Mahabir.

“No one knows how cohesive it needs to be to be referred to as gummy implants. I would argue all implants used today are gummy implants just to varying degrees,” says Dr. Calobrace. Ultimately, he says implants today are on a continuum of least gummy to most gummy.  

“A gummy bear implant implies that the silicone gel inside the implant is more solid than it is liquid. If you were to take a knife and cut one open, the consistency inside is very similar to that inside a gummy bear,” Drs. Kurtovic and Mahabir say. “The technical term is cohesivity, and different implant companies have created implants that have different levels of cohesiveness. For example, Allergan has three different levels of cohesivity, allowing surgeons to taper the level of cohesiveness to the particular patient or need.”

The potential benefits of gummy bear implants

“Implants with firmer gels have less rippling and upper breast fullness that make them popular,” says Dr. Jewell. He points to a manuscript he wrote comparing various gel formulations in terms of upright stability, and gummy bear implants came out on top. “Gummy bear implants contain a thicker, more form-stable silicone gel, making them less prone to palpable and visible edges as are common with saline implants,” says Wichita, KS plastic surgeon Amy Sprole, MD. She adds that the naturalness in appearance due to less visible rippling contributes to their popularity.

It’s all about preference and personalization

While the term gummy bear implants is trending, some doctors don’t necessarily recommend them to patients. Dr. Antimarino tends to recommend softer cohesive gel implants over the more cohesive gummy bear variants to more closely mimic the softness of natural breast tissue. Dr. Calobrace agrees, noting he finds them to be too firm and rigid. Ultimately the right implant for you comes down to personal preference and what works best with your body and lifestyle.

Drs. Sprole, Jewell, Kurtovic and Mahabir consider gummy bear implants a good option. Drs. Kurtovic and Mahabir generally stick to recommending this kind of implant because of “its superior, long-term performance and natural feel and results.” In their opinion, it’s “the most modern and safest implant available on the market today.”

Dr. Sprole is confident that virtually all breast implant patients would do well with gummy bear implants. However, she notes they are “particularly helpful in those patients who are very lean, with very little breast tissue—those patients for whom the implant is the majority of the breast volume and shape.”

Dr. Antimarino notes that in a reconstructive setting where the patient requires radiation, he often considers gummy bear implants with more cohesive gel. “Radiation will thicken the overlying skin and will dampen the projection of a softer implant. The most cohesive gel can prevent this because it is firmer,” he explains.