Balding 22 Year Old Woman (with Photos)

This 22 year old patient came to see me for hair loss she’s been experiencing for the past 2 years. She did all of the right things, saw two dermatologists, and received a complete medical work-up for a variety of disease entities and vitamin deficiencies and was found to be normal. What I told her is as follows:

1. Obtain a new test for androgen sensitivity of her hair based upon a genetic test
2. If she is sensitive to androgen, we might try her on an androgen blocker such as finasteride or dutasteride in the hope that this will block enough of the androgen to allow better hair growth.

The science is minimal that support this thesis, but it is better to try to block the androgens on women who are positive to the genetic test for androgen sensitivity than to put all women on the drugs.

In addition, as we could not offer her an immediate benefit with drugs, we used a concealer treatment on her hair and showed her how to do this herself. Her comment after the application of DermMatch was, “I have been reborn”.

I apologize for the blurriness of the before photo. Click the photos below to enlarge. Before (left); After (right)