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I am taking good care of myself with a 1000 calorie diet and daily exercise, but I am losing hair anyways. Can I have a thyroid problem?

Hi Dr. Rassman, I’ve been a “lurker” on your blog for yrs, 46 yrs old and if I were to guess, a Norwood 3. I’ve been taking finaesteride for about 1 1/2 years, shampoo with nizoral a couple times / week. I started using Rogaine foam for a few months, but at $62 CAD / mth, it was starting to add up. I’m single, confidence is severely lacking as a result of my receding hairline, so dating isn’t really an option and needless to say I’m always looking for options. l almost considered going for a consultation with Hair Club, but decided against it for now at least. I did come across this article and wondered if you had heard anything about it.

Thanks for having this blog, allowing for people like me a chance to see your advice, keep up with any new developments etc.

There was an article on SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN April 9, 2015 Hair Regrowth Discovery Suggests Skin Cells Communicate Like Bacteria
“When a researcher at the University of Southern California and his colleagues plucked 200 hairs from mice in a specific pattern in a confined area—ensuring that many neighboring hairs were pulled—more than 1,000 hairs grew back in their place, including some beyond the plucked region. “
This finding does not translate into finding a cure for male pattern balding or hair loss in humans. in fact, if you continued to pluck your hairs, they would eventually stop growing. The finding in the study does not mean that if you pluck your own hairs, more will grow. It does however give us a new perspective on cell signaling. More research would be needed to see how it can be applied for practical human applications.

To address your concern for hair loss that relates to a lack of confidence or dating: There are plenty of confident bald or receding men where hair loss is not a factor. Of course everyone is different and if hair loss or hair recession bothers you, see a doctor for possible treatment options. Norwood 3 hair loss pattern can be easily addressed with a good hair transplant surgery.

CHICAGO – A Cook County woman is suing a physician, alleging negligence, after her husband died while undergoing an elective hair restoration procedure in December 2014. The suit alleges that despite the patient’s history of heart disease, no EKG monitoring was used during the operation, which may have prevented his death. This is now the second death that I am aware of. The need for proper monitoring during any surgery is critical during any surgical procedure and I think patients would insist on having the doctor on-hand able to handle any eventuality that occurs that puts you at risk. Some doctors are known to leave the office during a hair transplant procedure leaving the care of their patients to technicians. We are experience and trained in advanced life support so we can handle any emergency that occurs. Hair transplantation (including FUE) is a surgical procedure and as such, REQUIRES the doctor’s presence through the entire procedure and that the doctor is prepared for any eventuality. We have done over 15,000 surgeries without incidence.

There are many dermatologic diseases that will kill transplanted hairs. Most of these diseases have signs that are present, either obvious ones like alopecia areata or subtle ones like Frontal Fibrosing Alopecia. These diseases are easily diagnosed by a doctor who is an expert in this field or a dermatologist who specializes in diseases of the scalp. The key is to have the diagnosis made in advance, something that an experienced hair transplant surgeon will always look for.

This man found that his surgeon used 3-4 hair grafts for the beard. It is clear that there is a texture difference between his normal beard and the transplanted beard as well as skin deformities. I wonder if it would be worth while removing each graft that has multiple hairs and corbelling and replace them with beard hair from under the chin. You can have a test area done and see if it solves the problem to your satisfaction before rushing into a large surgical procedure. Then, after 6 months or so, it the test area approach works, you can replace your entire beard transplant as with the test site ?

Doctor, how does DHT affect the eyebrows? Im 18, balding, and have noticed that i can pull out 4-5 eyebrow hairs in one small tug. Am I loosing my eyebrows too? Can propecia stop this as well?

Well, for starters you should stop pulling on your eyebrows!

I do not believe DHT affects eyebrows as it does scalp hair. Remember, the main reason for hair loss (male pattern baldness) in only partly about DHT. Yes, DHT is responsible… but the main reason for male pattern hair loss is your GENETICS interacting with DHT. Eyebrow hair is not part of the male balding process, and as such, Propecia will likely not do anything to help your eyebrows.