In the News – The Hair Loss Cures Are Coming
Snippet from the article:
The good news is that new research in Japan, France and the US has moved closer to the goal of “curing” male baldness.
Dr George Cotsarelis, head of dermatology at the University of Pennsylvania, recently announced he was in talks with pharmaceutical companies about making a drug to block an enzyme he believes causes baldness. The enzyme, prostaglandin D2, was identified in a research paper in February as instructing follicles to stop the production of hair. But his laboratory is not the only one racing for a cure.
In June, Dr Bruno Bernard of L’Oréal said he and his team had discovered that thinning hair is often due to follicles being in a “dormant” phase. It is all to do with the level of oxygen around stem cells called CD34+ cells. He thinks that by targeting these cells he can awaken them.
Meanwhile in Japan, a hairless mouse was given a stem-cell treatment to transplant hair follicles on its head from a hairy mouse. This breakthrough could mean that follicles might be grown in a lab and then transplanted on to the head.
Read the rest — A cure for baldness? It’s just a hair’s breadth away
There was a great focus on the work by Dr Cotsarelis and prostaglandin D2 at the recent 2012 ISHRS meeting. I’ll keep my fingers crossed that any of these new treatments (or “cures”) become a reality.
does propecia really matter then by blocking dht? if all this new researach is proposing new methods that are the cause of hairloss, then does it mean dht is really not a factor as it used to be claimed?
Eli, drugs are approved based on data that need to show effectiveness, regardless of the next ‘cure’ that researchers “believe’ will happen “sometime’ based on test tube or animal data from a diffeerent mechanism. (note: the average drug development program from conception to market takes 10 years and close to $$1 billion). Many conditions can be affected by different mechanisms, so that none of the above are mutually exclusive. But, bottom line: Propecia works and it works via the mechanism noted, although other mechanisms may someday also contribute to therapies. think about high blood pressure, and the different drugs (calcum channel blockers, beta blockers, angiotensin-converting-enzyme inhibitor, etc)that affect the vasculature via difefrent mechanisms
Eli – I’ve noticed you ask this sort of question a lot (I’m assuming you’re the same Eli who comments on these articles of course). The fact that each research team has a slightly different pathway to halt or even reverse hair loss would suggest that there isn’t one single action that results in hair loss.
But the fact is – propecia does slow down, halt and in some cases regrows lost hair. Therefore blocking DHT logically has some causal relationship. Perhaps DHT accelerates or makes the follicles more succeptible to certain prostaglandins or engages the action of prostaglandins (which are intertwined with hormone actions).
The advantage to targeting a lower pathway action would mean treatments that don’t have any direct action on androgens. I’m sure a lot of people, even those who tolerate propecia would welcome another option that doesn’t impact major hormonal chemistry (simply because most people would prefer not to risk even the small side effect potential).