Category: Other

Snippet from the article:

In response to an inspirational online campaign urging Mattel to make a Barbie for kids with cancer, the toy maker announced on its Facebook page today that it will introduce a bald Barbie.

The doll, who will be a friend of Barbie, will be donated to hospitals treating children affected by hair loss throughout the U.S. and Canada. The company will also give dolls and monetary donations to CureSearch for Children’s Cancer and the National Alopecia Areata Foundation.

Mattel posted on its wall:
We are pleased to share with our community that next year we will be producing a fashion doll, that will be a friend of Barbie, which will include wigs, hats, scarves and other fashion accessories to provide girls with a traditional fashion play experience. For those girls who choose, the wigs and head coverings can be interchanged or completely removed.

Read the rest — Barbie will go bald for kids with cancer

We wrote about the campaign earlier this year, so it’s good to see Mattel was paying attention and willing to step up to support these kids.

Snippet from the non-hair-loss-related-but-still-impotant article:

Prostate cancer screening has become increasingly polarized, with experts weighing in on both sides of the equation. The draft recommendation issued by the US Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) in October 2011 ignited the controversy — like pouring gasoline into the fire.

Now 2 experts with opposing views on the USPTF recommendation offer evidence for and against routine screening with the prostate-specific antigen (PSA) test. The point–counterpoint appears in the March issue of Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers and Prevention.

The USPTF draft recommendation advised against routine screening with the PSA test, as reported at the time by Medscape Medical News. The USPTF had previously recommended against routine PSA screening in men older than 75 years, but the draft extends that to all men. It gives routine screening in men younger than 75 years a “D” rating, which means “there is moderate or high certainty that the service has no benefit or that the harms outweigh the benefits.”

Read the rest — PSA Testing Continues to Polarize Medical Community

I know this isn’t a hair loss related entry, but it is an important issue I wanted to discuss. So what is this all about? In patients with prostate cancer, a protein (PSA – prostate specific antigen) is found in the blood. It is a cancer marker and like many cancer markers that are detected early (like in a pap test for cervical cancer) their presence means that the person who has tested positive, has cancer of that particular organ.

It has always been a goal to try to detect cancer early enough to produce a cure; however, it is thought that some breast cancers and now even the prostate cancers may never grow enough to be life threatening. If a woman has an in-situ breast cancer that will never grow (can be detected in about 10% of women who were autopsied) or potentially threaten her life, should the breast come off if it is present? That is the question.

For the prostate, even if the cancer grows as the PSA blood test indicates that it does (and biopsies often confirm its presence), is the treatment worse than the disease? Few patients with known prostate cancer ever die from the disease, as they usually die from other diseases like stroke and heart disease. If a man undergoes a prostate surgery, or radiation therapy, or other radical treatments to treat the prostate, their quality of life is often impacted by urinary and fecal incontinence (having to wear diapers for the rest of their lives), have chronic pain from surgery, lose their sexual capability, have their testicles taken off, etc.

The men who have extensively researched treatments for their prostate cancer easily get confused by the various doctors and their prejudices for treating the disease. The surgeons wanted to take out the prostate, the radiation therapist wanted to radiate the prostate, and so on. The medical community is “up in the air” on what to do to manage the wide differences between opinions of experts worldwide.

Now to add more confusion to the discussion, some small percentage of patients do die from prostate cancer, and when the disease spreads to the bones, there could be severe pain associated with the metastasis; but the problem is that today’s doctors do not know which patients with known elevated PSA tests will develop the virulent metastatic “killer” prostate disease. The decisions for the patient are like playing Russian roulette with the quality of what remains of their life.

In the article recently published in Science Translational Medicine, it was shown that the enzyme prostaglandin D2 (PGD2) was elevated in bald scalps at the mRNA and protein levels.

In a group of 17 men, bald scalp was compared with haired scalp and showed elevated PGD2 levels. The authors also found that PGD2 and a related metabolite 15-dPGJ2 inhibited hair growth in both mice and men, providing insights into the prostaglandin pathway in genetic balding. They found a receptor in the bald scalp which is responsible for mediating the negative effects of PGD2, suggesting that therapeutic drug targets could be developed for a possible topical treatment. They have determined that this receptor may impact the hair characteristics (i.e. straight or curly).

Dr. Walter Unger wrote his take as follows:

Unfortunately, baldness is not caused by a single factor but rather multiple ones. The most important and well-known one is the correlation of balding with a male hormone called dihydrotestosterone (which is a byproduct of the more well-known testosterone). Specifically, we have known for many years that you cannot develop MPB unless you have an excess production of that hormone in the affected areas. Yet, many years later, we still do not have a “cure” for everybody’s baldness either in terms of stopping the progression in everybody or regrowing hair in everybody though anti-dihydrotestosterone drugs such as finasteride (Propecia) and Dutasteride certainly help many people with male pattern baldness (MPB) and female pattern hair loss (FPHL)—to varying degrees.

Dr. Garza’s and Dr. Cotsarelis’s announcement of the role of another factor, Prostaglandin D2 synthase, appears to represent another building block towards the ultimate goal of medical treatment of MPB and perhaps FPHL. However, we have no idea as yet, if it is, for example, more or less important than dihydrotestosterone or any other of the substances already implicated in MPB and FPHL. Unfortunately, despite the media frenzy, “the end of baldness” likely remains well down the road.

Dr. Rassman

I know you’ve commented before on Prince Harry, but I noticed some better pictures found here, including close up from above: link

Do you think this is balding and if so, what norwood would he be at and possibly progress to?

Thanks

That is one great collection of royalty. He clearly has vertex balding, but his frontal hairline can not be seen clearly, so I can not guess what his final pattern is. I also do not know if he is using any medication, which makes sense to arrest the hair loss, thereby modifying his final pattern.

Flat out doc….
when is there going to be a cure for hair loss? I mean come on, our scientist have done some seemingly impossible things, yet we can’t figure out hair loss? I don’t believe it. There has to be a way. They seemed to have been able to reverse it in mice at a %100 effectiveness rate what about humans??? Our bodies can do amazing things there is no way you can tell me it can’t regrow hair. I believe it’s possible…….

The fountain of youth has also failed to materialize. I would like to think that one day there will be a true hair loss cure, but I have no way to know if or when it will happen.

Hi doctors,
I saw this video of a stem cell treatment that says you have “noticeable” results in a couple weeks. What do you think about this?

Here’s the link on Youtube.

When any stem cell treatment is advertised and promoted as producing hair within 2 weeks, I’d think that this is another stem cell fraud, just as the TV program 60 Minutes recently covered. It’s interesting that this video just shows computer animations and not photo results, but regardless, to my knowledge there is no proven effective stem cell treatment for hair loss on the market today… particularly one that grows hair in a couple of weeks.

I’ve embedded their video here, but I don’t believe their claims for a second:

Hi Doctors,

I stumbled upon your blog as I was searching online for some relevant information to my question, and let me start by saying that this is a fantastic blog and I am really impressed with the efforts that you have put into it.

I’m a 23 year old male and there is an issue that really annoys me, which is the lack of body hair in general. I am of caucasian background, and all of the males in my immediate and extended families seem to have a health hair growth (body and face). I have always thought it was because I was a late-bloomer, but now I am starting to have doubts that it might actually be because of a hormone imbalance. What do you think I should do? Thanks in advance.

It is not unusual for men of your age to either have no or little body hair. It may be genetics or it might be hormonal (although this diagnosis rarely is made). I do not have a suggestion for you other than wait and see what the future brings you as you age further.

Believe me, in many ways, I wish I had this problem. I’m not a big fan of shaving my beard every day.

Snippet from the article:

The placement of an ad is critical. If the context is just right it can amplify an ad’s message, but if it’s wrong it can backfire.

Canadian agency, Rethink, may end up somewhere between right and wrong with their latest transit ad for Panorama Hair, a company that specializes in hair transplants. The agency has placed mirrors with the tagline “The Hair Loss Specialists” on transit trains around Canada to give a panoramic view of commuters’ bald spots.

Read the rest (and see a photo of the ad) — This Cruel Subway Ad Uses Mirrors To Call Out Balding Men

While I’m sure someone thought this would be a clever way to market their services, putting mirrors overhead to let everyone see your bald spot (with an advertisement for treating hair loss) comes across as a little insensitive to the balding men.

Hi Doctors,
As an avid reader of this blog I have developed a pretty broad understanding of the genetic balding process and the various treatment options available, and for that I thank you. The one question that has recently surfaced involves gene expression. I know your not a geneticist, however,with your knowledge in both biology and and androgenetic alopecia I’d assume this would be within your general fund of knowledge. An individual can carry the gene for genetic hairloss, but not express it.

My question is what is controlling the expression? I’m assuming environmental variables are involved (stress, maybe nutrition to a certain extent) but is there a biological explanation? From my brief studies in biology, I remember hearing something about the role of transcription factors in the expression of particular genes. Your thoughts are much appreciated.

You said about what I know of the mechanisms for gene expression. It’s beyond my scope. You can use Google to find articles and theories about gene regulation, but I’m posting this in case a geneticist (or armchair geneticist) would like to contribute in the comments.