18 months on finasteride and minoxidil with some reasonably good reversal of the hair loss
I’m just curious if anyone knows how long the regrowth will last on finasteride before it stops and if there’s any possibility of regrowth beyond maybe 10-15 cm up top for people in my position. thanks all.
Both Rogaine (minoxidil) and Finasteride have peak actions in about 2 years. They usually maintain the benefits provided that you continue to take the drug, otherwise, all of the benefits are lost in a few months.
This doesn’t look like about 1200 grafts; however, it is almost impossible for me to tell at this stage as some of the grafts may have already fallen out. Ask your doctor for the graft count in your surgical record. Many patients send me such photos and want to to check up to see if their doctor was honest. This is sad, because of the doubts that people like you have about being cheated. Hopefully, you will get your post operative pictures and a copy of your surgical record and be more comforted by what you learn.
I have a lot of faith in Breezula. I think people really understimate the fact that Breezula not only protects hair follicles against DHT, but also against testosterone. That in itself is massive news. I understand there’s a lot of skeptics because of the trials. At 6 months it performed better than finasteride and at 12 it did worse. I would be interested in what u/wrassman thinks on this. Personally, I do not believe in the upregulation of DHT theory. I also do not believe that hair follicles would develop resistance to this medicine, either. There’s nothing in a hair follicle that would permit that. Anyways, it’ll be interesting to see.
Breezula is an antiandrogen presently undergoing tests on a Third level of clinical trial testing. There is great promise here from what I read about this medication and the best part it doesn’t seem to get into the body when it is applied to the skin. I don’t have experience with this drug.
My question is how soon can I wear my turban again?
After an FUE, the wounds are usually closed in under 5 days or so and all of the crusts are gone from the recipient area. As a Sikh patient, using a clean Turban at one week is reasonable as long as there are no crusts on the recipient area the the Turban is not too tightly wrapped. The problem you will have is a return of the traction alopecia if the Turban is tight
You should be washing your hair the day after the hair transplant surgery to keep it clean of crusting. Of course, everything is healed by the 3rd month and washing your hair is good hygiene.
FUE produces “punctate scars” which show up clearly on your head. The more FUEs that you do, the more FUE scars will be seen. If you do too many, then these scars will dominate your head. Every time the human body is cut, it heals with a scar. There is no such thing as a completely scar-less surgery. The surgeon tries to use very small punches to make the wounds small which then usually produce small scars. Punch sizes of 0.9mm or less are best for small, less detectable scars. Ask your surgeon what size punch he/she used.
In an interesting article in the Hair Transplant Forum by Nicole Rogers, M.D., has a review of the association of the existence of androgens in men who were infected with severe cases of Covid-19 suggested a relationship between the two. “This protease has a 15 base pair androgen response element, and in humans, androgens are the only know transcription promoters for the TMPRSS2 gene. The ACE2 receptor, which is also a route of COVID entry, is also mediated by androgens.”
Men with balding may have had an increased risk to the Covid-19 virus and severe disease. Women, of course, don’t have the androgens and it is possible that their estrogen protects them against the virus. There is also a suggestion that men who take androgen blocking medications like finasteride, dutasteride, Spironolactone, Enzalutamide and even canabidoil might help mitigate the severity of the disease. This is all hypothetical as there is no direct evidence for this in studies that have been done to date. The date has probably been collected but not looked at with this in mind.
Just be patient. By the 8th month you can expect to see 90 percent of the growth from your hair transplant. Some people don’t start growing until the 4th or 5th month. When it starts, it grows out at a rate of about 1/2 inch per month. You are hopefully, one of these later bloomers.
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You have kept your 5 year-old hairline. Don’t feel bad, assuming you are the same age as they are, you will be in the category of people like Bill Clinton who kept his 5 year-old hairline into his early presidency. The juvenile hairline is rounded, concave in shape. All boys and girls at the age of 4-6 have this hairline and you were fortunate to keep it. Maybe you will become president one day. Tell anyone that makes fun of you that you and Bill Clinton share the same hairline, that should be on-up for you.
At 5 days, you have far too many crusts on your beard. What you are seeing is probably the crusting not the Herpes. You should nevertheless start taking your acyclovir because wounds like this tend to bring on the Herpes, possibly in the recipient wounds themselves.Many doctors would have put you on the acyclovir just for having a beard and mustache hair transplant. You need proper washing of your crusts to get them off. See your doctor as you shouldn’t look like this at 5 days, it is poor post-operative management.
Some men just decide that they don’t want to fuss with medications and go for a hair transplant. As you know from my writings here on Reddit, I believe that a man should be over 25-26 before going for a hair transplant because they won’t like surprises like this link shows a man over a 40 year period and his balding: https://baldingblog.com/need-master-plan-think-hair-transplants-photos/
For good hair transplant planning, you need to know where your hair loss pattern is going and if you are willing to take finasteride, it would be likely stable after the hair transplant, depending upon what you and your surgeon decide are reasonable goals.
There is clearly hair growing in the crown where there was not hair before which reflects growth. It is possible that you did not get enough grafts to do the job right? For the size of your crown, I would have expected at least 2000-2500 grafts depending upon the thickness of your hair, the finer hair requiring more grafts. Men with very fine hair with say 2000 grafts, could get this type of result because the hair just doesn’t have the bulk to it. I would either consider another hair transplant or possibly scalp micropigmentation (see here: https://scalpmicropigmentation.com/gallery/thinning-hair/#!https://scalpmicropigmentation.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/scalp_micropigmentation-new_hair_institute-042-thinning_hair.jpg).
In my material, I give to EVERY patient who gets a prescription, material that contains all of the risks of finasteride, from mental illness claims to sexual side effect claims. I NEVER push finasteride on patients. I do not own Merck stock. I always do what is best for the patient in conjunction with a consultation understanding their goals and when I make recommendations, whatever they be, I always have a consultation with the patient and NEVER prescribe finasteride over the internet not understanding the people I consult with. I am not sure why you are angry, but if you experienced side effects and did not educate yourself, then you are to blame if you had problems with the drug. If you look on Baldingblog.com and search finasteride, you will see article and information galore on both the benefit and the liabilities of this drug.
I know that Biden had hair transplants in the old days with ‘plugs’ but got these repaired some years ago so he looks normal now. Trump I know had a Scalp Reduction (cutting out the bald spot in his crown) but I am not sure if he also had hair transplants. The scalp reduction left him with a scar down the middle of his head. I think that he wears a high end hair piece now.