How Many Grafts Would Be Needed to Fill In a Norwood 7?

Hello, I’m dealing with MPB and am currently at 3 or 4 on the Norwood scale. I’m considering a transplant sometime soon. I have no allusions of obtaining a pompadour, rather I would just like to cut my hair short after the procedure and have it look like a buzz cut.

My question is, worst case scenerio, if someone came in with a Norwood 7, how many grafts would it roughly take to completely fill in the bald area. I understand there are a lot of contributing factors (ie. available donor area, quality of donor hair, et cetera), but I would just like a rough estimate (3,000-5,000?) if possible. Thanks in advance!

There are many ways to answer this question, but it varies by the quality and the availability of the hair to tackle the job. Every person needs a Master Plan when undergoing any surgical hair restoration procedure. The available supply varies in individuals and some people will never have enough hair to fill in a Class 7 pattern. Everyone is different with their own preference for hair styles.

Generally speaking, hair transplant surgery is limited by the number of grafts (hairs) you can donate. A few thousand hairs will never look like tens of thousands of hairs. Thus, hair transplantation takes advantage of hair color, skin color, hair texture, hairstyle, and hair length. The longer you keep your hair, the more full it will look. In other words, keeping your hair short in a buzz cut will not be the best hair style choice if you are considering a hair transplant surgery. These are the some of the issues you need to discuss with a hair transplant surgeon before you consider the surgery.

Typically a Norwood 7 patient will require 7000+ grafts to cover the entire balding scalp, but I must reiterate that it will NEVER be enough to look full with a buzzed haircut (even if you transplant 8000 grafts). You must understand that a Norwood 7 patient likely lost about 70,000+ hairs from a 100,000 hair starting point.