The avascular part of the scalp averages 0.5mm thick, and below the epidermis of the scalp lies the upper reticular dermis. The hair follicles in the upper reticular dermis have stem cells nearby, usually above the sebaceous gland. Wounding this area is critical to getting a response to the healing cascade with microneedling that stimulates these stem cells. If you go down 0.5mm, you will not reach this area, and if you go down to 0.075, it will not induce the best result of the microneedling healing cascade.
I’m planning on making the switch from topical to oral fin (been doing min/fin solution for about a year). Anything I should be mindful of when making the switch? Google results are mostly on Min when I search it up. Does it take time for the oral version to take effect? I’m guessing having a overlap period would be a good idea.
From my experience you can quit the topical and go directly to the oral with no consequence.
If you have money for transplants, is there a reason you would still have a balding head or fully bald? Hulk Hogan’s son, for example, could easily afford a transplant but never did and eventually went bald. I also know a lot of balding rich people, even younger ones.
This is a great question. Some people don’t mind being bald or partially bald. When I look at Gene Hackman (actor) and watch the frontal hairline disappear over his career, I note what an excellent candidate he would make. But Gene Hackman’s fame was at a time when hair transplants were deforming procedures, not like today. Frank Sinatra had a hair transplant, and I am told he wore a wig for many years. I know that Sinatra was angry as hell because one of his best friends, another celebrity whom I transplanted, had a conversation with Sinatra, who was “Burned” by the grotesque look his hair transplant surgeon gave him. Unfortunately, he never knew the era when good hair transplants were commonplace.
Not everyone cares about their balding. We did surgery on a celebrity with a hairline like Gene Hackman, but he refused to let us restore his normal hairline; he just wanted to reinforce the thinning element of his heavily receded hairline. He did that because people knew him with a receded hairline, so he wanted to keep his image the same. This is an important insight. The lesson I learned here is that not everyone wants a normal hairline after they lose it.
I performed a hair transplant on the CEO of a multibillion-dollar company. He loved his results, and most people thought he was working out to look younger. He told me he was amazed that no one in the company, or his friends and family (other than his wife), knew he had his hair transplanted. A few years later, his company published its annual newsletter, and someone from his marketing department pulled an old picture of him to use in the newsletter, the balding photo of him. He was furious. Many of his employees figured out that he must have been transplanted. His secret was out. He told me that this event brought him back to his balding sense of self that he thought was long gone.
If my girlfriend touched my scalp after I put topical finasteride on it and whe gets pregnanty, will that cause a problem with the baby? Or is it like alcohol, where it is too soon to have any impact on the child at the time of conception vs pregnancy? So I am asking if she comes in contact with topical fin during conception and has no contact going forward, are we okay? To be more clear, are the risks of a woman coming in contact with topical finasteride while conceiving as dangerous as when pregnant.
I wish I could give you a clear answer. There is no real answer to your question; however, you need to know that topical finasteride gets absorbed systemically, so it’s like taking the oral form. Topical liposomal finasteride, on the other hand, cuts the systemic absorption down to what I understand is under 20%, and there is less systemic finasteride to get into the semen. Also, in the original Merck studies on Propecia, the company didn’t recognize a risk to conception; however, as more litigation emerged, Merck changed their position to put this as a potential risk. I am certain of one thing; however, of the millions of men on the oral finasteride over the years, I have not seen any correlations to fetal abnormalities that particularly stand out in a medical study (comparing thousands of conceptions in women whose men were on finasteride vs. not on finasteride). The amount of finasteride in the semen is almost unmeasurable, according to Merck. Handling the drug for a pregnant woman is listed as a NO NO in the original Merck material.
Of the men who have had abnormal babies, it is hard to distinguish, statistically, if these abnormalities were caused by finasteride or the normal variation that occurs in the non-finasteride population. My heart always goes out to these men because they blame themselves for the abnormalities. They also blamed their doctors, the manufacturer, the FDA, and one man blamed me because I didn’t take a firm stand on the connection between Finasteride and fetal abnormalities.
I have no idea if drinking topical minoxidil is safe or not but … If it were safe and effective ( that is a big if ), wouldn’t one bottle of Kirkland minoxidil last for 8 months? You can save a lot of money this way, right?
Minoxidil is a dangerous medication with potentially fatal consequences. Drinking an UNKNOWN dose of topical minoxidil may put you at risk, so why go there? You can be marginally wealthier when you’re dead.
i’ve been taking iron supplements for some time now (i think i’m in week 2) and i’m wondering if it would bring back my temple hair, my hair looks like norwood 2 in the norwood scale – i have a few strands on my temple side if that even matters. idk if my hair problems is caused by my iron deficiency or it would even help it, so let me know
Let’s assume that you are balding. If that is the case and you have an Iron deficiency, it may contribute to the hair loss. It is always best to fix a problem with your Iron levels, regardless of the hair loss. Perhaps it will slow down the hair loss. Reversing the effects of Iron Deficiencies take time. Two weeks won’t cut it.
I have recently started oral minxodil, are there any adverse effects to combining saw palmetto and OM? Would I see no change or could I possibly see improvement with them in tandem?
Saw Palmetto has no value as a DHT blocker and, thus, in preventing hair loss.
I’m not trying to suggest that swimming causes MPB or anything like that. I’m just wondering if the chlorine or other chemicals in the pool could be detrimental for those of us already struggling?
The chlorine in the swimming pool may damage your hair, but the growth mechanism is below the scalp, not reached by the pool water. There is a difference between damage to hair that has already grown and new hair that just emerges into your world. If you look at a long hair carefully, the part of the hair closes to the scalp is new and in its best shape, unless your have miniaturization associated with genetic hair loss
Compared to the pictures from past months, my hair looks improved a bit (I mean really a bit). But I still see short, miniaturized hair fall. My medication history: 10 months on fin 1mg, 5 months on dut 0.5mg, 4 months on oral minoxidil 5mg. Why do the miniaturized hairs remain?
Just because you are taking good medications for your hair loss, there is no guarantee that the progressive nature of your hair loss will reverse all of the miniaturization you have. Stay on the coarse, and time will tell you where you will be down the road.
The swirl area is always difficult because the hairs do not layer but rather draw one’s eye to the center of the vortex. The impacts of 4000 grafts depend upon the thickness of your hair shafts (fine, medium or coarse). The thicker the hair shafts, the better the coverage. I suspect that, looking at your result, your hair has a medium or medium-fine hair thickness. Please let me know if I am correct. The transplant was largely done in front of the swirl, but half of the upper swirl was included in the transplant. Note how difficult it is to get a tight swirl unless you put in more hair or have coarser hair. This is a nice result. Rarely does new hair appear from a hair transplant beyond 9 months. Congrats!
As an aside, look at my crown hair transplant, which was fine when it was done; however, when my hair thinned out with age, a see-through appearance showed my scalp. I had SMP done and the change was dramatic, see here; https://baldingblog.com/i-just-finished-my-smp-on-my-crown-area-today-see-before-and-after-photos/
The photos show a very early response in just 2 months. Most young men are in a rush to see the response to medications, but the real good results, if they occur, will come about well after 6 months.
I stumbled upon a video a month ago with over a million views where a doctor talks about how to regrow hair, and the main conclusion seems to be that eating steak will fix your hair, delivered with just enough half-truths to seem convincing. I’m not even a vegetarian, but this carnivore cult stuff is getting on my nerves. Is there anything to this claim?
Steak doesn’t reverse the genetics and the chemistry of hair loss. The internet is full of misinformation, that is clear.
Does this look like 5000 grafts to you? That is what they said they gave me when I went to Turkey for the transplant. What can I expect in the future?
5000 grafts is well over half of your donor hair supply. You need to have your remaining donor supply evaluated by someone who understands the donor supply. After you have gone a year, the last of the growth will have occurred. Then, look at where you are and have a good surgeon develop a Master Personalized Plan based on your remaining donor supply. From that, you will know what you can do. This is what I do: https://baldingblog.com/creating-a-personalized-master-plan-for-present-and-future-balding-photos/
A dog is a dog no matter what you call it. Many names have been developed for this technique for marketing purposes. Our group originally named it Scalp Micropigmentation as my group was the first to do it for clinical cases like surgeries, various scalp diseases, scars, etc. I always publish the things I do and have published many articles on Scalp Micropigmentation. I have lectured on it at many meetings worldwide, even last January in India. This is essentially a tattoo that appears like cut hairs on the scalp. To mimic the cut hairs, the dots must be very small, and the ink has to be permanent. The person using it must be artistic because otherwise, the look can be awful. Here are two examples of poorly done SMP: https://baldingblog.com/terrible-smp-3/ and https://baldingblog.com/what-do-you-think-of-my-smp-photo/ and https://baldingblog.com/terrible-smp/
The third link shows some poor victim who had it done by someone clueless. Don’t be a victim; do your research. There are many poor SMP operators out there.
I’m confused about the effectiveness of taking both oral and topical finasteride simultaneously. Please give me some insight into this practice.
I don’t see a point in taking oral and topical finasteride simultaneously. The oral form is better as it reaches the areas the topical form can’t reach. The topical also goes systemic, so your systemic dose may be much higher than oral. The use of topical liposomal finasteride is different than the standard topical finasteride as it is designed to stay mostly in the scalp. This liposomal preparation is used when there are side effects from the systemic finasteride.