Author: Dr. William Rassman

“I’m seeing a few hundred hairs in the shower drain every day. I really don’t think I am balding, but I came to ses you because I wanted to be sure that if I was balding, you could transplant my hair and keep it looking good.”

This comment reflected the comments, one way or the other, of many men who visit me, but this particular day, this 26 year old actor who just finished his first role in a major movie came to me with the above comment. He looked like a typical hairy 26 year old male and I thought that after I measured his hair bulk, that I would reassure him that he was not balding. Much to my surprise, the numbers from the tests surprised me but shock him. The tests indicated that he already lost 50% of his hair bulk in the front of his head just behind his hairline, and 40% in the top (between his ears) and crown (back) of his head. He came apart emotionally. “This can’t happen to me”, he said. “I am going to hit it big time in Hollywood, I have an interview coming up for my second film, now a leading man, and I just can’t go bald”.

I tried to calm him down. At 26, he could go on the drug finasteride and probably stop most of his hair loss, so that was the ‘good news’ I told him. But despite my reassurance, he had difficulty letting go of the idea that his career was going to be ruined. “They won’t take me on if they knew”, he said. Again, I tried to reassure him that the drug might very well buy him years on keeping his hair, but he would not, could not focus on what I said. Over and over again he said “It over, my life is over”.

Hair loss is devastating for many young men and they don’t have to be heading to the top of the Hollywood scene to feel the way this man did. Although the drug often turns out to be effective in 26 year old men, the reality is that some day he will have to face balding. Although preventive hair transplants are a terrible and improper decision for him now, if and when he starts losing his hair, this may become an option. He left very unhappy and even unwilling to consider taking the drug finasteride. I asked him to return to see me, but he was from out-of-town and not easily accessible, but I called him a week later anyway and he promised to see me in 4 months on his return to Los Angeles. I wonder if he will deny what I told him or if he will think this matter through and make the logical decision to try to slow down the balding process and fill the prescription I gave him.

A good photo to show your recession should be a frontal view with your hair pulled back and your eyebrows lifted high so that the creases on the forehead show up. This will show the anatomical landmarks to measure where your hairline belongs and more about what the shape should be. A normal hairline is one finger breadth above the highest crease of the furrowed brow. Anything higher is recession. I can only guess that this man doesn’t have recession because the frontal hairline is flat, which is an evolutionary step towards a mature hairline, but if he supplied me the photos as I outlined above, I could be more definitive.

 

This is a remarkable injury from a car accident where this woman lost most of her scalp. The initial surgery to address the loss of her scalp was with the use of split-thickness skin grafts (left photo), probably taken from her thigh or abdomen. The grafts covered the skull so that the skull didn’t die off; however, her look was clearly abnormal as you can tell in the middle photo. You can see the brusing of the split-thickness grafts. I imagine she probably used a wig to cover the deformity shown below.

Dr. Felix Popescu, from Bucharest, did approximately 3500 grafts to cover the deformity and give her back her hair. The photos below only show before and after extending 2 days, but the skin looks viable, suggesting this surgery might work. The zoomed-in view shows that a good blood supply is available to the grafts. Split-thickness skin grafts don’t have an infrastructure to support much beyond the skin grafts. I hope he will send me follow-up photos over the next few days and eventually of the final results. I greatly admire his skill and courage in tackling such a difficult case.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Surgery performed by Felix Popescu, M.D.

Dr. Felix Hair Implant
Soseaua Nordului, No. 98 G
Bucharest, Romania, 14104

I have been taking Ambien for about 5 month. Over the past 5 months, my hair has receded almost 2 inches from hair line. I could not figure out why until my husband advised me to Google the medicine I was taking. It’s such a relief to see that I am not alone and I have the same symptoms with the tingling, sometimes itchy, scalp. Please tell me that the hair will grow back?

There are no reports indicating that Ambien causes hair loss. Many people taking Ambien may be stressed or have other conditions that can cause hair loss.

Some men are very sensitive to minoxidil.

In my case, Ambien caused excessive hair loss with scalp irritation. I don’t believe my alarming hair loss and tingly, itchy scalp problems, which began precisely at the same time I started taking Ambien, is just a coincidence. The shedding slowed down dramatically after I stopped taking Ambien as did the scalp discomfort. If this is a generic drug issue versus brand we’ll never know, but I’m willing to bet it is not the latter given it’s unaffordable cost for most of us and the 0% coverage with even the priciest of insurance plans. Try stopping for a week. You have nothing to lose except your hair.

Yes, Ambien is known to cause hair loss. Since you stopped taking Ambien, it seems to prove the cause and effect.