Hey there Dr. Rassman. I’ve been reading through your site here for a few months after I noticed some thinning at the front of my hairline. I’ve been on Propecia for over a month now and I feel better about the situation but obviously have not had any results yet. The reason I’m contacting you is because, frankly, my hair is very, very important to me and it’s hard for me to effectively convey that to my primary care doctor. Is it unusual for patients to travel cross country to seek your treatment or would I be better off finding someone here in Memphis? I am not in a current financial situation that would allow me to come see you but some day I might really want intensive care for my hair. I can tell by reading your material that you are wise man who cares about people. I would appreciate any correspondence and advice you have to offer.
Our practice is not a typical hair restoration practice in that a good number of our patients do travel a long way to see us, though more than half of our patients are local to California or surrounding states. For those patients who are not local to one of our offices, you can set up a “virtual consultation” with us to get an initial opinion. Some things can be managed without a face to face meeting, but we often direct those potential patients to at least have a phone call. We encourage the use of photographs to help us understand the problems at hand. Hair is very important to our audience and many of those we do a virtual consultation with over the phone have developed questions from reading this blog. If you’d like to request additional info or setup a consultation, check here.
With just a month on Propecia and without knowing more about your hair loss situation, I couldn’t begin to guess if you’re a candidate for hair transplant surgery. Hypothetically though, you should choose the surgeon that can best fits your needs and that you feel most comfortable with. I wouldn’t suggest basing your decision on convenience. For those coming from out of town for surgery, we do offer a travel program.
A man who tore the wig off a telegenic Taiwan legislator last year was sentenced to five months in jail for depriving the MP of his freedom to look good, a court spokesman said Tuesday.
I know this will just sound like a plug for my new book, Hair Loss and Replacement for Dummies, but I haven’t mentioned it nearly as much as I should. There’s a reason for this post aside from the obvious — renowned hair transplant surgeon Dr Richard Shiell, author of many article and classic books in the field has written his review, which I’ve posted below. It serves as a good overview of what you can expect from the book, which I might add is sold online for under $12 at 
For every one email I post on the site, I probably answer 10-15… and even then, I can’t get to all of them. There have been a high number of people writing in asking for my opinion on this or that, and their email usually focuses on just one thing. In some cases, what that ends up doing is raising a lot of questions for me to ask back to them so I can help get them an answer. To render an opinion and help those that email the site, I must have lots of information and sometimes even good photos (and permission to publish them is encouraged). All too often there is nothing of the sort. I don’t want to be rude by simply saying that “you” need to see a doctor, but this is not a guessing game for me and while I do want to help, reason must prevail. Bottom line… if you are writing to BaldingBlog, make your case as concise as possible with as much relevant information that you can provide. It might sound like a contradiction, but I’ll try to clarify if you need more help. I enjoy writing the blog, but I can only answer what I’ve got to work with, so keep that in mind if you don’t get the reply you were hoping for.
The hair replacement industry is a multi-billion dollar industry. The difference in results between medical groups is highly variable because the surgery is NOT standardized. As such, the consumers (patients) are mostly left with the burden of researching through a massive number of ads and advertorials on late night TV, though these days there are many web forums that allow consumer input. The difference in cost is highly variable. I have seen and heard of surgeries that range from $1000 to $100,000!!! A few months ago I saw a patient who came to me for a second opinion after spending $152,000 on a hair transplant surgery and was angry that he did not get good results.
