Category: Hair Products

Hello,

I am 23 years old and already begin to thin around the crown of my head. Starting to notice hair on my pillow and when I shower. Thinning spot has been getting progressively more noticeable over the last 6 months. I have been using Rogaine for the last couple months without very much success. I am quite certain that stress and genetics are both major contributors to the early hairloss I am experiencing.

I have now begin to look at alternative treatment options and came across a laser therapy center claiming they have had 95% success rate over the last couple years. Laser therapy for a year was quoted just over $4000. That includes 15 mins under a laser helmet once a week for 12 months, a laser comb and topical solution for the 12 month timeframe. I have been advised that after the 12 months I would have to purchase topical solution for the rest of my life to avoid build up of DHT again which will progressively begin hair loss again. ($150/bottle every 7 months). According to the clinic they guarantee success or your money back (not something I would trust unless I see it in writing)

I would like to gain some insight into this type of treatment and see if anyone has had similar treatment with success. I am more than willing to spend the cash as my hair is an important part of my image and I have no desire to be bald by the time I am 30. Just want to make sure that the money is being well invested and that this is not a Scam.

Could you please provide me with some information on this type of hair loss therapy? Results? Studies? Success Stories? or anything else that can help in my decision. Thanks

I have written extensively about the use of lasers as a hair loss treatment — and simply stated, they do not work as claimed. To tell a client they have a 95% success rate — well, it depends on how they define “success”. If only 5% of their customers ask for a full refund, perhaps their judgment of success was that they were 95% successful in retaining your money. If they advertised a 95% success rate in regrowing hair, they’d probably be in violation of consumer fraud or advertising laws.

There was a recent case of a laser clinic in Chicago that was sued for refusing to honor their money-back guarantee when the laser treatment was found to be worthless, so just be sure to look out for these types of practices.

Here are some laser links worth reading:

1. What Percentage of a Chance Do You Give Laser Treatment of Working?
2. Reader Adds to the LaserComb / FDA Debate
3. Reader Checks in with His Thoughts on the Latest LaserComb Study

Dr. Rassman,

Strictly for the sake of playing devil’s advocate with you here —

When you imply that products offered by non-“Big Pharma” companies are likely bogus or that you don’t buy into their efficacy because the only proof of their viability is based on their own self-promotion basically (i.e. your posts about Drs. Lee or Proctor or even laser product makers), isn’t that slightly hypocritical? I mean, your career and business is of course enhanced by people foregoing these alternate methods, so shouldn’t people just as much suspect an ulterior motive on your part?

I understand your usual answer that, without personally seeing the research, you cannot recommend one way or another on something. But frankly, were you physically present for the Big Pharma trials on minox or finasteride? I’m assuming not. Going a step further then, I assume you base your support for those “proven” products on the basis that you read their documentation — so how much documentation is necessary for you to believe a product is in fact what is says? Some of those non-Big Pharma products people have written in about have “some” documentation, though certainly not to the extent of the FDA mandated trials I’m sure. Where do you (or do you at all) draw the line?

Or is your ultimate argument that, “If [said product] were that good, a Big Pharma company would have picked it up?”

Thanks for your time, love your site (though I had to plead ignorance to my girlfriend when I recognized you on her favorite show “Jon and Kate Plus 8”, haha), your replies on these sort of issues just sometimes irk me — aspirin was discovered by a non-Big Pharma guy, after all.

Oh boy. I never said I needed to be there during the research study of a product to know it was true or not. No, I wasn’t physically present at the trials of the finasteride or minoxidil, but those medications are proven to work and FDA approved. The problem with many of the products I’m asked about is that they come out of nowhere — old wives’ tales, myths, etc. Most of them offer testimonials or mentions of a study, but offer zero evidence that the study was even conducted or if it was even valid. People write to me at this site every single day asking for solutions to their hair loss. Should I tell them to just go ahead and potentially waste their time and money on an unproven product while they lose more hair that they can’t get back… or should I let them know about medications that are proven to be effective?

I have no bias to solutions produced by the large pharmaceutical companies. I look at everything that is offered in this field by the evidence that is produced for me to review. I have, for example, evaluated the hair laser and found that the actual research was inadequate to recommend that patients use the laser for hair growth. I even took it one step further and acquired a large laser system and tried it for 12 months at my cost for as many patients as I could find willing to be studied (for free). The results were clear that the Low Laser Light Therapy (LLLT) had no value to those patients that were studied by me. If I would have found otherwise, I could recommend this treatment and charge for its use (making money), but I can not do that if I am not convinced that it will work. I learned from the days I was a boy scout that “honesty is the best policy”, and I guess I am an old-fashioned clinical scientist.

All the over the counter products (segals , foltene , viviscal , revivogen) keep on saying that FDA wont approve any vitamin and mineral supplements and thay also say they dont have enough money to do that is it true? Is getting FDA approval that much an expensive process.(One distributer of segals solutions told me that shortage of funds prevents them from proving the effectiveness of Saw Palmetto as DHT blocker)

That is not entirely true. There are of course costs involved, but most dietary supplements don’t require FDA approval before they come to market. The key issue is that there is no patent on saw palmetto, so these supplement companies don’t have an exclusive right to sell it. They’d just be spending money to try to prove a supplement worked as claimed, only to possibly allow any company to reap the benefits of their costs. Plus, if that money was spent and it turned out that saw palmetto didn’t work as they claimed, sales of the supplement as a hair loss treatment would plummet.

I’ve written about a lot of this before, but the FDA oversees claims by any company or person who sells nearly any type of health-related product. The key to the FDA is that the products comply with good manufacturing practices (a term of art as used here) and that any claims can be substantiated with good science. Effectiveness and safety must be proved by the supplier when making any claims about benefits.