Question: Hello sir! I thought i’d reach out to someone who’s actually a professional. So i’m 19 years old and definitely lost a lot of volume in my hair really quickly in the last few months. I started Fin 1mg almost a week ago now. Took 4 pills so far. However i started feeling numbness in my penile region on the second day and now i feel it in my rectal area. Is this the so called nocebo affect?
Answer: I just read an article (just published) that suggested some neurological problems in the nerves that innovate the pelvis area with the drug finasteride. This is very new to me and the article is only an abstract so I can’t be critical in my analysis of it, but if you are having such side effects, stop the medication and it should go away in 2-3 weeks or so.
I think the article the doctor mentioned is the one that can be found at the link below. Not only does it find that some men who have post-finasteride-syndrome have neuropathy, but it also shows they have persistently reduced neurosteroids found in cerebrospinal fluid. These neurosteroids are not completely understood, but are thought to have a very significant role in maintaining nerve function, mood, and cognitive function.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0960076017301024
A PFS reader wrote into this blog about having finasteride induced neuropathy many years ago. I recommend stopping finasteride ASAP before more harm is done. Unfortunately, finasteride related neuropathy is not one of the symptoms that reverses with discontinuation of the medication. If you too have pudendal neuropathy, you will likely experience it in your perineum which may be what you are vaguely describing.
https://baldingblog.com/2011/11/18/pudendal-neuropathy-and-propecia/
I hope the hair transplant surgeons begin to wake up to the reality that this drug can be dangerous for some people that take it rather than defensively trying to be “critical of their analysis” of new studies as they are published.