I have not taken a survey to determine the frequency of the Gorilla population; however, seeing is believing.
Hims and other telehealth firms make finasteride easy to get and don’t have to disclose side effects in ads
Mark Millich said he suffered serious side effects after taking finasteride pills from Hims. Photo: Greg Kahn for WSJ
March 13, 2025 5:30 am ET
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Telehealth companies are aggressively marketing hair-loss medications to young men. Some of the patients said they had serious side effects and didn’t realize they were possible.
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Finasteride, the generic name for Propecia, is widely prescribed but has been linked to serious side effects in some men, including persistent sexual problems and suicidal thoughts.
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Telehealth companies say they disclose side effects and other risks on their websites. They say clinical studies show finasteride is effective and side effects are rare.
Mark Millich, 26 years old and insecure about his thinning hair, was curious about the ads he saw promising to reverse his hair loss. He completed a 14-question intake on Hims.com and received a bottle of finasteride pills days later. He never spoke to a doctor. ……………………………….
As I discussed yesterday, my experience with finasteride is not the same as reported here; however, the report discussed telemedicine without doctors involved and the use of a product that contained finasteride and other medications. I will not comment on the product as I have no first-hand knowledge of its use; however, I caution anyone who wants to treat their hair loss with medications to do it under the supervision of a good expert doctor in the hair field to avoid, prevent or manage complications. Even drugs like topical Rogaine, at higher than recommended doses, can put someone into heart failure if used improperly, higher dosage than recommended, or just as a consequence of taking it (rarely).
There are a few posts on Reddit that suggest that finasteride can make a man look younger; however, there are no clinical studies that back this observation.
Hair loss drug finasteride can cause debilitating side-effects, men say | CBC
https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/hair-loss-drug-finasteride-side-effects-1.7483898
Comment: Post finasteride syndrome, a condition that is associated with finasteride, seems to be much more rare than this article suggests. I have always told my patients that if they get symptoms to always call me. I usually discontinue the drug quickly. Dr. Bob Haber from Cleveland Ohio, studied this problem (see: https://baldingblog.com/comment-against-my-reporting-of-dr-habers-article-on-finasteride/). With feedback from over 50 doctors who have written prescriptions for well over a half million men, the conclusion was that they didn’t see post-finasteride syndrome if they stopped the drug relatively soon after starting it when these symptoms appeared. The drug has helped many men with controlling hair loss in my hands, for decades.
This man has what appears to be a chronic folliculitis. A transplant should not be done on him. He needs to be treated with appropriate antibiotics and should be clear of infection for at least 2 months before a hair transplant can be considered. Folliculitis with a hair transplant can wipe out the grafts and cause a failure of the transplant, so proper treatment is critical. I might even add a biopsy to confirm that there is no underlying disease in this man such as folliculitis decalvans, an autoimmune type of infection that is very difficult to control. I pointed to various clearly inflamed hair follicles in the photos with white arrows. Click on the photo to enlarge it.
I have started taking Fin 1mg for the past 20 days. I was suffering from mild depression, nothing serious, but the last few days, I have had more depressive thoughts. Does finasteride cause or increase depression? If I switch to oral minoxidil, then the risk of heart problems frightens me. How do I manage between these two drugs?
No drug is 100% safe. Men who have depression might consider not taking finasteride and try oral minoxidil as an alternative drug, as finasteride can induce depression if you are prone to depression. If you take minoxidil, you should watch out for side effects such as shortness of breath, unusual fatigue, swelling of the feet, and bouts of rapid heart rate. Look up the side effects on Google.
With coarser, curly hair, you have better hair to work with than most men. Also, you have the advantage of having miniaturized hairs in the corners of the frontal hairline, which tells me that you achieved reversal of some or most of these frontal miniaturized hairs.
I’m 38, topical fin/min/tretinoin user. Have seen some excellent recovery and regrowth which has given me so much confidence. I know this because I think less and less about my hair being thin. I have accepted there won’t be a full recovery and I’m at peace with it. Visited my brother and family at the weekend, I was sat with young niece on my shoulders and out of nowhere, she shouts out “you have a bald spot” whilst in the presence of friends and family. I was just like “cheers for that” and have thought it about for the past couple of days. I know it will pass, where I have this self-confidence issue but this isn’t the first time it’s happened – someone at work pointed it out as they walked behind me past my desk. “You’ve got a bald spot”. Thank you so much for that, I’m really glad you brought it to my attention, I will now think about this for the next few weeks.
My kids told me, when I was driving, that I had a bald spot and made fun of my Friar Tuck crown balding. I had it transplanted when I was in my 50s.
2 months of difference with estradiol and spiro (4 months total w/ estradiol & spiro; 4 years of minoxidil and finasteride) (you should not take estradiol or spiro if you look manly and want to continue looking manly)
Adding medications that feminize your look, may bring back your hair (as seen here); however, this is an extreme way that should not be used for most men unless they are interested in feminizing their loss. This patient returned to their juvenile hairline at the expense of possibly other changes, including the possibility of breast development of loss of male libido.
Buy a hand microscope from Amazon, then take careful photos and look for miniaturization. If it is there, it is the beginning of the balding pattern you may develop. Get the diagnosis from a good doctor and a treatment plan that fits your age and needs.
Unfortunately, this man had a hair transplant surgeon who needed help understanding how the recipient area grafts would be placed in the frontal hairline and behind it. The surgeon has 100% control of the direction and distribution of the recipient area grafts. This man has straight hair, which brings out the improperly placed hair even more dramatically. His hair was circularly placed like the spokes of a bicycle. Even using a thick styling agent, as in this photo, he could not get his hair to look normal. Hair in the frontal hairline points around a center point in the mid-head in an outward direction, following the direction of bicycle spokes.
In the mature male hairline, all frontal hairs grow parallel to each other and point forward, running parallel to the ground when you look straight ahead. A change in direction occurs at the ‘part’ where the hair transitions to pointing in the downward direction on the sides of your scalp. Picking the right surgeon is so important. This look is not easy to live with. Fixing it requires removing the frontal hairline, repositioning the hair in the correct direction, and then filling out the top area that is still bald.
For those of you interested in the difference between the mature male hairline and the female hairline, see here: https://baldingblog.com/female-hairline-transplanted-as-is-should-be-photos/
I had cancer a few years ago and went bald as a result. Women and general people we’re just slightly rude to me when they saw my dome. People at my high school during the time never talked to me especially women. One girl just flat out refused to work with me. I didn’t tell them I had cancer cuz I felt it would just ruin the mood so I just dealt with it. Fast forwarding to current day I have a borderline Norwood 3. Comb over and people treat me better compared to when I was bald. I just I feel kind of sad deep down cuz I know if I let my hair go I will be treated like trash. And I’m only 21 and literally no one has hair loss at my University but I’m lucky I have really good hair density to cover the receding parts but when it’s windy it doesn’t work out. I just want to get a hair transplant and continue living my life without thinking about my hair. Sorry, I just wanted to vent cuz no one will understand what it’s like. It is just insane, cancer did a lot of emotional damage to me but hair loss is doing more it seems. Like I’m really happy I’m alive but I just want that quality of life where hair loss is not draining on me and where I don’t feel out of place or old, or knowing the fact that if I go bald people will treat me badly.
Your experience, for the most part, builds strength and character. You might not recognize it when it was happening to you, but now, you seem to understand more about what you experienced. What you were seeing were not your issues; it was other people’s issues. Shame on them.
This diagnosis of Trichotelamania is made with a hand microscope, which shows how the hairs are actually broken as they come out of the scalp. Trichotillomania is an obsessive-compulsive disorder in which a person picks out their hair. As you can see from the patient’s photo, the hair loss is not in a particular known pattern, which alerts the doctor that the diagnosis is not genetic balding. These cases can be transplanted; however, unless the underlying obsessive disorder is fixed, the patient will pull out the hair-transplanted grafts to the same fate. I rarely perform surgery on these patients, even when they swear that the picking problem has been solved.
my question is, if I do a hair transplant and start treating the transplanted hair with minoxidil, will they become addicted to it? and if I cancel minoxidil, won’t they fall out? because, as the doctor told me, transplanted hair is for life, but I am tormented by doubts due to the cancellation of minoxidil
You are right to question this. Minoxidil dependent hairs, if they grew, should survive the hair transplant so I generally tell my surgical patients to stop the minoxidil the day before the surgery and pick it up again in 1 week after the surgery. I make that judgement based on the existence of Minoxidil dependent hair.
I started losing my hair at the age of 18 in 2020, as soon as it was noticeable I decided to shave it off with a machine. But last year, in December, I decided to let it grow because I wanted to have it evaluated by a doctor, I let it grow for 4 months. And here is the thing, I realized that my hair was falling out a lot, I was probably losing between 100-200 hairs a day, every time I woke up I could easily see 30 hairs on the pillow, my hair was falling out just by pulling it or passing my hand through my head. I had the appointment and shaved it again, however, I noticed that my hair is no longer falling out and that there is no more hairs on my pillow, so my question is, is it possible for the hair to only fall out when it reaches a certain length? Or is this BS?
Hair has two basic phases for you to recognize. The first phase is called Anagen, which is the growth phase and starts when a new hair emerges from the scalp. Usually, for each hair loss, a new one emerges from the scalp. The anagen cycle lasts for different periods of time depending upon age and sex. Women have longer anagen cycles when they are young. One of my old girlfriends, had hair grow to a length below her waist. Woman’s anagen cycle can last between 3-7 years on average