Category: Uncategorized

Why can’t the procedure be done under general anesthesia, to avoid the shock loss associated with the local anesthesia and the epinephrine used with the local anesthesia?

General anesthesia has risks that local anesthesia doesn’t have (the death rate is about 1:20,000 people). In addition, hair transplants are very long procedures, and general anesthesia would cost a lot of money for 8 hours and put you at more risk than needed.

Almost all Caucasian males develop a maturing hairline. When recession occurs, it usually is associated with hair loss elsewhere on the head and scalp and that is why I perform a HAIRCHECK if I have any doubts on the distinction between a receded hairline and the appearance of a maturing male hairline. The HAIRCHECK instrument will show hair loss behind the hairline which always occurs when the hairline is receding. The picture of me below shows a V Shaped mature hairline that is 100% mine since it changed from the rounded hairline of my youth. This hairline was not transplant but my entire crown was transplanted with 2700 grafts. The second picture shows early hairline recession that was transplanted along with a replacement of the temple peaks. You can see that this hairline was ‘ratty’ in appearance which is essentially what often happens when the hairline starts eroding.

DHT levels have no value when you are considering taking finasteride for male genetic hair loss. Young men have good testosterone levels and therefore will have good DHT levels so measuring these levels does not change the treatment goals

When I was 17 the temples of my hairline had receded and I now have very minimal crown loss . I’ve been using minoxidil with dermarolling for the last 3 months on my hairline but all I can see are very tiny vellus hairs along my hairline. However for the past couple days I’ve been having day long migraines and I suspect it might be the minoxidil so I’m stopping use until around next week.

Hair transplants are personal decisions. Knowing what you might look like by looking at family members might help you understand better, especially if you can speak with those that are still alive and ask them if they could get their hair back (an completely undetectable hair transplant) would they have done it. You need to sit down with an expert in this field (hair restoration) and get a Master Plan worked out for your future hair loss problems if your hair loss should occur.

It’s hard for me to imagine that anyone would intentionally or unintentionally do this to any human being. Immoral and terrible!

I had lung cancer and my last chemo treatment was in July of 2012. I finished radiation in October December 2012. I had some balding prior to the Chemotherapy that you might classify as a Norwood Class 6 pattern, but there was still hair throughout the head. It was just thinning. It has been almost two years and now my hair loss pattern is very clear and all of the thinning hair has not come back. I have a few sparse hairs all over my head, but they are very sparse. I am off my medications at this time. Will my hair come back and what can I do to help it. I have used Nioxin for two years and just recently started uses minoxidil. Are there vitamins to help? Just what can I do?

I do not know how to help you. You clearly had male pattern balding that was not complete and the chemotherapy stressed your fine, miniaturized hairs and finished the balding process in them. One of our patients had used the ‘Cold Cap’ when the took Chemotherapy and lost less than half of the hair. Few doctors are aware of this treatment. At this stage, I believe that you can expect that hair regrowth will not occur. We have a treatment that may be worth looking at, called Scalp Micropigmentation (scalpmicropigmentation.com). Many patients convert from a Class 6 or 7 pattern to a full looking head of hair by taking on a shaved look. Just like the star of Breaking Bad, many men look great with the shaved look and your case does parallel the main character’s appearance. This is something to consider. Many times I ask myself if SMP was available when I started to treat my hair loss, would I have chosen this option. The answer is yes, but at my age, this is not something that I would do considering that my hair loss is gone and my hair transplants were 100% successful in addressing by large crown loss.

This email came from a transplant patient of mine from years back…

About eight or nine months ago, I had a low testosterone test result and began taking testosterone shots to respond to this. My urologist assured me that the shots would not cause hair loss, but I’d appreciate knowing from you your thoughts on the subject if possible. To my viewpoint, my hair seems to be thinner, but I am not objective (or rationale) on the subject.

If you have been taking testosterone for 9 months and have not seen an impact causing hair loss, then you should be safe with regard to this potential problem. I would assume that those hairs which are genetically impacted by the balding process are all gone by now and all you are left with is hair that will not fall out with testosterone. Your transplanted hair falls into this category.

If you were a young men and still had active balding, then you would have seen hair loss by this time from the testosterone.