In the News – Like a Forest Fire of Hair Loss

Snippet from the article:

Matt Kelley was 38 when he first noticed a round, hairless spot in his beard. Within six weeks, every inch of his body that once had hair — including his eyebrows, eyelashes, arms and head — was completely bald.

“It was like a forest fire of hair loss,” Mr. Kelley said.

Mr. Kelley, now 43, has alopecia areata, an autoimmune disease that causes the body to attack its own hair follicles. Alopecia, which does not include normal male-pattern baldness, affects nearly 2 percent of the global population and has no universally effective treatment. Its progression is unpredictable and can range from a few bald patches to a completely hairless scalp to the loss of every hair on a person’s body — known as alopecia universalis. Sometimes the hair regrows, sometimes it does not, and sometimes it grows in only to fall out again years later.

Read the full story at the NY Times — A ‘Forest Fire of Hair Loss,’ and Its Scars

The article discusses how quickly this disease wiped out all of this man’s hair, the impact it had on his life, and the treatments he’s tried. The recent alopecia areata gene discoveries that were announced earlier this month has brought about renewed hope for a cure or at least a reliable treatment for those with this disease.