Shaving the Recipient Area Before a Hair Transplant

Dear DR. Rassman,

I notice that unlike other transplant doctors you don’t shave or buzz the donor or recipient sites. What is your feeling about this. If you’ve already answered this somewhere else, I apologize.

I know how difficult it is for a person to undergo a buzz cut in the frontal area just to accommodate a hair transplant, so I have learned how to do this over the years without that close cut. This has, of course, helped my practice as people have built in camouflage with no forced haircut. I have been working in this field for 19 years. I know other doctors don’t do it this way, but I also know how important it is for patients to preserve the privacy and return to work rapidly after the procedure.

Over the past dozen years, we have also done other things that make the hair transplant undetectable. The swelling that was initially a major problem, now is almost completely gone and the graft hole sizes are so small, that they are nearly invisible in the first couple of days unless there is a significant pink color in a very white skinned person. The crusting which has been an annoyance for up to 2 weeks, now is washed away and most of my patients have an undetectable surgery within days of the procedure, enough to return to work in a couple of days.