Scalp Lacerations – Follow-Up

This is a follow-up to our post from earlier this month: Scalp Lacerations Required Staples — Will Hair Regrow There?

Thank you for responding so concisely to my query regarding hair regrowth surrounding a scalp laceration closed with staples.

The orientation of the wounds seems to be almost perfectly aligned with the Langer lines (the wounds are located upon the occipital protuberance and are titled stightly from being perfectly horizontal). From your commentary, I find this encouraging.

Also, to remove the guess work of assumption, the wounds were stapled about 1 hour after initial injury, the wounds were created by the fist of a criminal assailant, and no infection has henceforth appeared. I even went so far as to have the staples removed by a plastic surgeon so as to avoid further damage caused by clumsiness.

I gather, from your comment, excision is contra-recommended. How many follicular hair units am I looking at to fill the described area via hair transplant if there is not satisfactory hair regrowth?

The size of the wound and the character of your hair will dictate the number of grafts. If the infrastructure of the skin is intact, one session should be adequate, but if there is no infrastructure (can feel the skull) then sometimes two smaller sessions are needed.

There is no substitute for a direct examination, which then relies on the judgment of the surgeon and his/her experience.