Dr. Rassman
If you were to judge from your own picture (the one shown on the website), would you say you have genetic hairloss? If so, to what degree?
I had a bald crown measuring about 3 inches round. This is classified as a pure vertex balding pattern. I originally made a mistake and had scalp reductions in the early 90s, which left me scarred. Since that time, I have had hair transplants and the scars and balding spot is largely gone. My hairline is natural.
(male)
Hey guys im hoping you can help me. I’m 18 i have a problem, now i dont know why i dont have hair on my legs, 1 could it be becuase i dont eat the right food, 2 i dont excersie enough or is it just that my DHT level is low, and why would it be low? i have bvery little hair, only around my ankles not alot but a little, over the month of June last week i was on Vacation, i noticd that i had a little more hair growing then it stopped am i imagining this or is there something wrong
This is a maturing process and body hair increases as one ages. At 18, you may be on the left of the bell curve, which means waiting it out. Leg hair increases in the 20s in most men.
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Hi Doc
I dye my hair after a cut, about every 4 or 5 weeks. If there’s no scalp irritation is it safe to assume an accelerated hair loss isn’t from the dye? Can dye increase hair loss if there’s no scalp reaction that I’m aware of? I noticed the increase about the time I started the dye over a year ago. I started Propecia about 2 months ago.
Thanks
Safe dying should not produce or accelerate genetic hair loss. By safe, I mean that the bleach is not driven into the hair follicle below the skin to cause chemical injury.
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If shedding occurs after starting minoxidil and then hair in that area regrows, are those regrown hairs now minoxidil dependent? If minoxidil regrows hair that wasn’t there to start with, i can understand the dependency, but if it sheds hair that was there to start with and then makes those hairs require minoxidil to survive, I have to wonder if its even worth using this stuff.
If there is shedding from minoxidil, it should be complete in 1-2 months and that should not be enough time to build dependencies. This is an educated guess and I am not aware of any study that would back up my opinion here.
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hello Dr…
I used Minoxidil for a while and stopped as i feel it created some problem in my erection.i need to know how long it will take for me to get rid of the side effects.
I could guess that maybe you have ED and that a small drop in your blood pressure, which is a side effect of minoxidil, is helping it along (meant to be negative). Honestly though, I couldn’t tell you based on the info you’ve supplied (none).
As I do not know your age and have not examined you, I generally think that some doctor might be able to help. If I knew more about you, maybe I could help. With that said, minoxidil is not known to produce erectile dysfunction (ED) or a libido drop like finasteride does. See a doctor for a complete examination.
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Hi Doc!
I have been losing my hair for about 4 years now. I have used a number of products already including Avacore, Rogaine and most recently Kevis. I have been using Kevis now for about 6 months with no results. I have been losing more hair then I have ever lost on the other products though the people at Kevis had told me that I would not lose any hair and that the success rate is over 90%. They also said that I will see results within 2-3 months and when I told them that I dont see anything they said that I will have to wait 6-9 months before seeing any results and that I will have to double the dose. I am now completely bald at the sides- in the front and the middle is thinning terribly. I really want to stop using Kevis but I’d like to know if there is anything you recommend doing as an alternative hair loss program.
Thank you so much for your help.
What you are telling me is that you believed what you were told by salesmen who profited by giving you advice. Bad advice that ended up putting more money in their pockets. That is a shame. The ingredient in Kevis that the company promotes as HUCP is hyaluronan (hyaluronic acid), which is a supplement commonly used to treat joint pain — not hair loss. That is just one of a handful of ingredients listed, including water, alcohol, sorbic acid (a food preservative), and biotin (which is also known as vitamin B7). Although the product packaging and website certainly look slick, there is no science here. I can’t even find any before / after photos on their website, which should tell you something about the product right off the bat. All I see there are stock photos of happy people with full heads of hair.
Although I don’t know your age, I’m going to assume you are in your early to mid 20s. You should have seen a doctor and instead of wasting your money and the precious hair that you may have lost forever because of the delays, you should have been put on Propecia (finasteride 1mg). Propecia is the only oral FDA approved treatment for hair loss and it would’ve almost certainly halted the loss a 20 year old (again, just guessing on your age). It’s still not too late to do it right, so see a good doctor (dermatologist or hair transplant surgeon who is ethical) and get on the track to the correct treatment. The other treatments you mentioned (Avacor and Rogaine) are minoxidil, which apparently does not work on you.
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Hi,
For a while now Ive been looking into buying the Lasercomb and finally came to the decision of doing so. However, I am confused if not a little uneducated. There seems to be NUMEROUS versions of the lasercomb manufactured under many companies!!! Hairmax Lasercomb, Rezultz LaserComb (sold by Medical Hair Restoration), Bosley LaserComb and the list goes on …
Is there a significant difference between the different manufacturers???
Thank you!
I am not a fan of this technology, but the HairMax, Rezultz, and Bosley LaserComb models are all made by the same company — Lexington International. So it is one manufacturer and likely the only difference between each is the logo and the price the reseller charges (all well over the price they’re worth, in my opinion). Note the photos below (found on the sellers’ websites), and see how Bosley and HairMax are the exact same image with different logos on the unit, while at least MHR’s Rezultz marketing folks bothered to take their own photos from a different angle and lighting:
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I’ve heard antibiotics can effect DHT levels i.e. get rid of any gut bacteria that has DHT under control, esp. in the case of soy/equol. Any truth to this?
See a previous blog post about Equol. I don’t have much to add to this reference. The DHT block is about 70% efficient with finasteride and 90% efficient with dutasteride. What the added value of soy is… well, I don’t know if it has any further value. Of course one wonders if there is an effect where it could work instead of the drug approach. My general comment is that someone who might try it with known genetic balding would run the risk of losing hair that could have been saved with a more conventional approach, so I would not recommend soy as a substitute.
Certainly any bacterial impact from antibiotics would be short term.
I stopped taking Propecia 16 days ago b/c of the mental side effects associated with it i.e. loss of wit and tripping over words. I also stopped taking saw palmetto at the same time. After about 2 weeks, I was back to my old normal self, hair still thinning but not any different than usual. I started up saw palmetto two days ago, and I’ve noticed again that my tripping over words has come back, although not as much as before. Is this possible with a “natural herb”??
Also, before I started taking Propecia, I took saw palmetto for about 7 days, and I didn’t notice anything then. I also didn’t notice anything for the first two weeks on Propecia. How can I sort this out?
Try just the Propecia without the saw palmetto. Anything is possible with a natural herb. Many natural herbs can alter mood (see peyote, marijuana, etc), so while I have not known saw palmetto to alter one’s mood, I couldn’t rule it out entirely. Also, because supplements like saw palmetto are not regulated by the FDA, the quality control process might not be up to high standards with regard to safety and effectiveness. I don’t know where you bought it, the manufacturer, the amount you’re taking, and the various saw palmetto sold may have different dosages that do not really reflect what the label says.
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I’ve read that there haven’t been many (if any) conclusive studies about saw palmetto’s effect on hair loss. But what about saw palmetto’s effect on BPH? Do you know how effective it is for that? The Mayo Clinic grades saw palmetto as an A (on a scale of A to F) in terms of effectiveness for BPH.
If saw palmetto has weak DHT blocking ability, and it’s just a berry, why not take like 10 pills a day (instead of the usual 2)?
The impact of saw palmetto on prostate problems has a lot of history that goes back hundreds of years. The product has been studied, but although there is no doubt an effect on BPH (benign prostate hypertrophy or swollen prostate) at reducing symptoms with difficulty in urination, it does not seem to work on DHT. It has been suggested that its mechanism of action is something other than DHT effects and that is why it may not help in hair loss.
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