Touch-Up Hair Transplants

What are your thoughts on “touch up” transplants? I am currently 27 yrs old and have had thinning in my front forelock since I was 18. When I was 24 I started Propecia and although it has progressed (from the size of a dime to a quarter) It has been slow.. This makes me think that my problem could be solved with 800 or so grafts. The rest of my head has good thickness. I realize you’re going to recomend a “master plan” and “hair mapping”, but if you could include your thoughts on touch up’s. It would be appreciated. Most importantly on what criteria you would recomend them, if any.

thank you.

It is impossible for me to tell you about your hair loss and treatment plans from a simple blog posting. You seem to know about the importance of a Master Plan and miniaturization mapping and with any transplant work that you are considering, anticipating the future direction of the hair loss is critical to balance things like:

1. Supply/demand of donor hair use
2. The rate of hair loss for following your progressive hair loss over time
3. Budgeting appropriately to follow-through with what you start

If you are concerned about your hair loss, your next step is to see a good, honest hair transplant doctor. If you saying that you already had a hair transplant or two or three, and this is a touch-up (meaning another small hair transplant procedure) you should ask your doctor how many more of these are needed to make sure that you know where it will all end sometime.

Sometimes patients come to me with a preconceived number of grafts they need. Often times these numbers do not match their expectations and the real needs to achieve the goals. Everyone’s needs and the criteria for choosing the numbers of grafts are different based on hair color, skin color, hair texture, head shape, etc, etc. See Patient’s Guide — How Many Grafts Will I Need?

I do not understand what you mean by a “touch up” transplant. You should either have a hair transplant to meet your goals or you should not have a transplant at all. There are some patients who may come back a year later for more fullness or address other areas and as there may be a risk of shock loss, you need to prepare a worst case scenario. You may see this as a “touch up”, but as you can see, it is related to the goals and expectations of a hair transplant program.