Hello doctor. About 3-4 weeks ago, I was prescribed tretinoin gel(Vitamin A acid – mild gel 0.01%) for my facial acne. I haven’t noticed anything, but as I was browsing the balding blog entries, I noticed that someone in the past had brought up a question about acne medication causing hair loss.
My question is: does tretinoin gel(Vitamin A acid)cause hair loss if it is applied to the face/cheek region? My doctor did not go over the side effects and the box doesn’t mention anything about side effects. I was told to take one cream and night and another one at morning.
Thank you very much.
Hair loss is listed as a known common side effect of tretinoin (also known as Retin-A), but it is also used by some people in conjunction with minoxidil to grow hair.
Here’s what I wrote in a blog post a few years back — “Retin-A is applied to the skin and can produce burns to the skin. It is believed that a light burn will make the skin more able to absorb other medications (like minoxidil for hair loss), because increased vasculatiry is induced by the burn.”
So will it make you lose hair even if you apply it only to your face? I can’t say for sure, but it is a possibility.
As far as I have read is that hair loss in only a common side effect when tretinoin is used in the oral capsule form such as Vesanoid, it never mentions hair loss for gel topical form.
I am an african-american woman, and I have been on the retin-a regimen for my facial acne for the past 2 years, and have been having major issues with hairloss during that time. It has gotten so bad that I stopped retin-a altogether about a month ago, buzzed off all my hair, and have started taking steroid injections on the scalp to stimulate growth. Retin-a might be the culprit. Only time will tell.
I have been using retin a for years and only recently noticed how thin my hair has become. I also have thyroid problems, which I blamed it on. Now as I look back, at my thyroid, even at its worse I never lost any hair, not like this anyway. I pulled my hair back the other day and my hairline is so thin and starting to recede even. Lets talk eyebrows and eyelashes also just barely have what I had a couple of years ago, and I never lost those at all with my hypothyroidism. So do you think I have harmed my liver? That makes your hair fall out?
I too have hair loss and think it’s from tetroin gel. After stopping it has anyone had their hair grow? I just recently quit using it.
I have been using tretinoin for 2 years, and the hair on the top of my scalp is thinning, with spots showing complete loss. I am certain it’s the tretitnoin cream, and have completely halted its usage. I’ll wait 2-3months before commenting on whether there are any improvements of regrowth. What an awful side effect of Retinoids. Terribly, and not worth the cream! Ladies, beware. This is so depressing.