This is a wonderful response to microneedling, finasteride and minoxidil over a 6 month time-frame
I’ve done a lot of research on here. I love how I’m not the only one dealing with this. Father went bald at 22 and my grandfather is bald as well.
I noticed hairloss around my sophomore year of highschool. Pretty mild crown bald spot. Had a person come tell me my crown had no hair and that I should move it. Little did I know there was nothing to cover the spot with.
I have very curly hair from my mothers side. I took a lot of her genes from some reason but it seems like the big gene I took from my father is hairloss. Around a year ago I started to use Shea moisturizer curling cream since again I have curly hair. I didn’t realize that the curling moisturizer itself was doing something to my hair until I stopped using it during quarantine. My hair started falling out quite rapidly. ALOT of dandruff which it itched a lot not sure because it was amount of showers I was taking or what. Then again still unsure. I never went outside during this period so my body was all over lol. I returned back to Cantu curling and my hair looks a lil better after a week I don’t know if there’s something in the cream that helps my hair. Anyways besides the point.
I knew I was going bald. My hairline has be receding. There’s nothing but single strands of hair across my hairline that was once there. The top of my head is also. I can pretty much see a lot more of my scalp. But the back of my head has perfect hair. I want to try fin. I’m not to worried about the whole beard and facial hair issue. I have a thick full beard at 18 and seems like I’ve hit the peak of my puberty I guess you can say. I see there’s a lot of side effects going on with ED and stuff then again I’ll just stop taking it if it’s severe. I wanna get this discussed with a doctor first but I would like to hear from the other teens here since I know there’s much more commenting then posting.
-how was fin treated you ? -how bad are the side effects if so how long did they last? -should I really take this at this age?
If your father went bald at 22 and you get his genes, the only possibility to hold on to your hair is the drug finasteride. Men who get a Norwood Class 7 by their mid-20s have never been studied with finasteride at an early age like 17-18. With the HAIRCHECK instrument, the diagnosis may be much easier when the hair loss first starts along this path, possibly as early as 18 years old. This type of balding is aggressive so the treatment with finasteride has to be timely and consistent.
This is a nice result from treating the hairline with topical finasteride. The hairline in the corner came down to it normal mature position.
The Dermatologist told me I could take Rogaine for 4 years and I would keep almost all my hair for the rest of my life. I would even get better results when I use Finasteride with it. I’ve never heard about this 3/4 year cycle and then the hair loss magically stops, any idea what she meant? The appointment was very short, about 5 minutes.
Hair has a 3 year growth cycle. Drugs like finasteride impact both the length of this cycle as well as the quality of miniaturized hairs that are present during the growth cycle. Rogaine does not impact the growth cycle but does stimulate new hair growth in some people. For young men, finasteride is a better treatment for hair loss that minoxidil. It sounds like you did not get all of your questions answered.
This looks like Alpecia areata, an autoimmune disease which impacts the hair. You should see a dermatologist and upon examination with a hand microscope he/she will see ‘exclamation mark’ hairs which makes the diagnosis. The a biopsy and a special treatment routine is needed.
4000 grafts taken from the donor area pushes the donor area’s ability to support such a large procedure when the donor density is lower than average. I am afraid that too many men who push their doctors or go to clinics where very large FUE sessions are done regardless of their donor density, will find themselves bald in the back and side of the head, like this man with new balding in the back of the head.
I saw many side effects in fin and minoxidil. I just want to use dermaroller for my hairline. Does this work?
There is good evidence that just microneedling and the wound healing that happens after that will produce hair growth without finasteride and minoxidil. The addition of those two drugs increase the effectiveness but are probably not critical to it.
This young man took photos over a 6 month period. This is unusually good growth within 6 months.
Your donor supply looks pushed. If you harvest more grafts in this areas where it was harvested before, you may deplete the donor area and become bald there. There is a limit to how many hairs can be supplied by the donor area. The safe area for harvesting I defined by the lines I drew (the safe area is between the lines) on the photo but as you can see, some of the grafts were taken from the non-permanent zone. I would not rush to get another hair transplant as the donor area will become more of a problem than the area where you are moving the grafts to fix. You might want to find a doctor who can do a strip surgery for more grafts as the depletion will be less in the areas shown.
I had 4500 grafts and can’t seem to get these scabs off . It is now 30 days since my surgery and although there are less scabs, they seem to remain. What do you think of the FUE area?
These crusts should never have formed. You should have been instructed in a washing protocol after the surgery that would give you no crusting. I’l bet you also had crust in the recipient area as well and had to wear a hat for cover. The donor area where the FUE was performed is too large, too high and too low which means that some of the grafts that were removed are not permanent hairs. The doctor seemed to want to push the numbers high so he/she extended the donor area outside the safe area. Is that what you asked the doctor to do?
Probably not. What I see is that you appear in the front to be transitioning into a male mature hairline as the widow’s peak is a remnant to where your hairline receded as it is moving to a mature hairline. Some men retain this widow’s peak unless they undergo genetic balding in which case they may lose the widow’s peak and the entire hairline as well. It appears that your left side is maturing faster than your right side.
I was thinking about shaving my head but I heard that if I do, it will prevent my hair from growing back. Is this really true?
If your hair has significant miniaturization with hairs that are not growing at this time, then these hairs may not grow back if they are now growing now. Advanced miniaturization of the hairs is often the end stage of hair loss. Other parts of your scalp where there is not end stage miniaturization, will grow back normally. Hairs in the early phase of miniaturization, grow slower than those hairs that are not miniaturized.
I developed an infection and met with my doctor who put me on antibiotics. It seemed to get better. I am worried about it harming the grafts in the recipient area. Is that a problem?
It is hard to tell from the pictures if the infection is under control but your doctor will tell you that and you should see no significant pimples or redness. If the infection was promptly treated, it will not harm the grafts. The good news is I see early growth already.
This curve shows the value of different doses of finasteride on hair growth. Note that a reduction of dose to half has a small effect on value
The scalp will shed these hairs if you are patient. The spicules of hair that you see will fall out very shortly. I know this because the direction of these hair are very irregular and appear to be ready to fall out. The shedding process is normal.
