Breast growth in men

Monday, January 02, 2012

Gynecomastia or the enlargement of male breasts is caused by an imbalance of the female hormone oestrogen and the male hormone testosterone, and in most cases can leave a man feeling self-conscious about his appearance.

"This condition can either be acquired or congenital, (but) the acquired one is more common," explained urologist Dr Leroy Harrison. "The congenital ones would be more in the paediatric age group and the acquired one would be more in adults."

Breast growth can happen at any age for males and is not uncommon in newborns because of the fact that they are exposed to their mother's hormones while being breastfed.

However, the enlargement of the breast usually lasts for just a few months. Hormonal changes in the growing teenage years can also lead to gynecomastia for males at this stage of their life, but as is the case for babies, this condition usually disappears after a few months as well.

For an adult male, the condition could be the result of several factors, or might just be the symptom of other more serious medical conditions.

"Patients who have prostate cancer are being treated with hormonal medication, and as a result of the side effect of some of these medications, they get gynecomastia," explained the urologist.

Other causes of gynecomastia include chronic liver disease, exposure to the hormone oestrogen, kidney failure, a deficiency in testosterone, aging and smoking. Some men also experience breast enlargement as a result of obesity as fatty tissue is deposited into the breast.

"You do have some men who, when they put on a lot of weight, have hormonal problems because the testosterone gets converted into oestrogen and into fatty tissue, so the fat acts as another organ and that extra oestrogen can cause the breast to kind of look enlarged," said Harrison.

All individuals, whether male or female, have both oestrogen and testosterone, but the levels of these hormones usually fluctuate at different periods of a man's life and results in gynecomastia in some when the oestrogen levels become relatively high.

"When you have a relative increase in oestrogen, it's not that the oestrogen is going to be more than the testosterone, but it will increase more than the ordinary," said Harrison.

"You might find that two male patients might have the same oestrogen level, but one has gynecomastia and one doesn't, so it is not a specific level of oestrogen that you have to have to get an enlargement," he added.

The enlarged breast is usually non-cancerous and painless for some men, but it create discomfort for others. Because enlarged breasts is mostly a cosmetic problem, Harrison noted that not all men affected will necessarily visit the doctor. In cases where they do, they are usually prescribed drugs or encouraged to undergo surgery to remove the breast, so the chest area can become flat.

"We see it (gynecomastia), but because we don't do much studies in Jamaica, it is hard to give you an incident. A lot of people would have it, especially like the obese patients, but because it does not really cause pain, they won't necessarily go to the doctor for treatment," the doctor said.

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Breast growth in men