The reason they put titanium in your breast after taking a sample is because the titanium acts a marker where they took the sample.
This allows them to go back to the location they took the sample if needed.
The Titanium marker is inert and causes no harm, nor does it set off any airport alarms.
It is important to have the marker placed for future reference.
Adverse reaction to metallic marking device, including titanium, is an unlikely scenario following minor breast interventions, namely clip placements.
This may become a potential cause of pain and discomfort with regard to the affected breast.
Marker placement distinguishes multiple biopsied lesions within the same breast, prevents re-biopsy of benign lesions, enables multi-modality correlation, guides pre-operative localization and helps confirm surgical target removal.
A small metal clip may be inserted into the breast to mark the site of biopsy in case the tissue proves to be cancerous and additional surgery is required.
This clip is left inside the breast and is not harmful to the body. If the biopsy leads to more surgery, the clip will be removed at that time.
The marker is designed to attach to the breast tissue to prevent it from moving and usually this works.
When they are inserted under mammography there is a small chance they will move when the breast is released from the mammographic unit.
Sometimes when a woman is receiving chemotherapy to shrink a breast cancer before surgery, a clip is placed so the cancer can still be found at the operation.
Each clip is only 3mm in size.
The markers are made of stainless steel or titanium that will show up on your mammogram.