Trichodynia

I’ve been having weird pains in my scalp for the past 4 months or so and have noticed my hair is now thinning. I went to my physician and he mentioned something called trichodynia, though he told me it is just a theory and is not fully accepted by most doctors. I’ve never heard of it before and looked it up on Wikipedia. I wanted to know if you’ve heard of trichodynia and if you think there could be an association between hair loss and scalp pain, or if it could just be coincidental. I’m 34 years old and have just a mature hairline with no loss up until a few months ago when this pain started.

Also, I found this recent article about trichodynia on Google News

Thanks

I do not know the cause of your scalp pain. I have heard some patients complain about scalp pain when they have hair loss, but I had little to offer them. Trichodynia has some interesting ideas behind it, but there’s no proven link between hair loss and scalp pain. This could be a case of a peripheral neuropathy, something that neurologists work with all of the time… or as the reference article says, it could be psychological or caused by a fear of balding.

Peripheral neuropathy is common in diabetics and in some people with certain chronic diseases. It might be caused by medications you take, if you take any. I don’t believe that there is a common theory for this condition.