How Does a Doctor Know When Hair Loss Stabilizes Before a Transplant?
hi
i have two questions. i am planning on getting a transplant done. i have read on a couple transplant sites where the doctor has posted pictures of young patients under 35 saying “patients hair loss stabilized”. How exactly does the doctor know the hair loss has stabilized and no further loss will occur in a younger patient if he is on meds? is the doctor just pretending or assuming no more loss will occur?
my second question is about my own hair. My own hair under bright lights my hair looks terrible, thin and disgusting more so in the front. In pictures and normal light my hair is thicker and nobody can tell. so if I go for a procedure can I ask my doc doing the surgery to look at my hair under the harsh light and give me grafts according to the harsh lighting and so it looks thick under those lighting conditions?
I am not sure what your doctor means by “stabilized”. In young men, the hair situation is progressive, so unfortunately stability is not the rule. After a hair transplant, some of the hair loss will increase (shock loss)… so a hair transplant is destabilizing. You should be on finasteride for a good few weeks before you get the hair transplant to help minimize this destabilization. You and your doctor should talk about the surgery that he plans on doing.
Your second question needs to be directed to your hair transplant surgeon, who should be sensitive to your desires for where the transplants will be done and in what quantity. Keep in mind that harsh lighting commonly makes hair look terrible, but your doctor should be able to create a Master Plan modified for your individual desires and your best interest.
I do not understand Dr.Rassmans response. I have seen countless number of times either doctors or transplant recipiants putting “patients hairloss has stabilized with or without propecia.” What is the point of doing a procedure if you hair has not stabilized?
Every man we do a hair transplant on, a man of any age, the hair loss has not stabilized. The problem is worse the younger the man is. For a man in his 20s, hair loss is never stable but these men want hair anyway and are willing to follow their genetic pattern of hair loss. They get a hair transplant because they want hair while they are young enough to enjoy it.
Thanks for writing
I’m somewhat confused too – several hair surgeons have said say Norwood 3 is more common than Norwood 7 – and if the final pattern has shown surely it will have stabilised? Once the hair is gone it’s gone isn’t it? Otherwise every man with balding would be heading for a Norwood 7 and could never stabilise? I understand that a man in his 20s or 30s may want a transplant without reaching their final pattern but surely men in the 40s or older could have ‘stabilised’ as in reached their final pattern?