Hair Loss Basics
Why do people lose their hair?
People lose their hair suffering from the condition alopecia, not to be confused with the condition alopecia areata. Alopecia means any form of hair loss. There are a large number of causes for hair loss, some of which are dietary. Health can be a reason for it, scalp disorders can be another, and hormonal conditions also can trigger hair loss. Natural things like childbirth will also trigger hair loss. Hair loss, alopecia, can happen for so many different reasons. Diagnosis is sometimes quite difficult.
What is male pattern baldness?
Male pattern baldness is a form of hair loss which is hereditary. It can actually come from either side of the family, and can actually skip several generations. It manifests itself by loss of hair on the crown and at the temples first, and then generally, those patches join together leaving the top of the hair completely bald. This will affect something like 30% of men at the age thirty, 50% at the age of fifty, and 70% by the age of seventy. Some lucky men escape it altogether.
What treatments are available for male pattern baldness?
Treatments for male pattern baldness currently are Finasteride and Minoxidil. Minoxidil is slightly different in that it is not taken orally; it is sprayed onto the scalp twice a day and has the effect of certainly arresting hair loss, but in some cases, regrowing it. Finasteride is an oral drug which. In both cases it takes about a year to see whether they're effective for you as an individual. Finasteride and Minoxidil have both been clinically trialled and they're shown to produce hair growth in men. The other alternative at the moment is transplant surgery.
What is Finasteride?
Finasteride is a drug that has been intensely researched to be used in the prevention of male pattern hair loss. It's a drug which inhibits the male hormone, and it prevents testosterone turning into DHT or dehydro testosterone. The DHT is the substance which actually causes the hair loss. It settles in the hair follicle and causes the damage. By preventing that transference from testosterone to DHT, you can prevent the hair loss.
Does Finasteride help slow or reverse male-pattern baldness?
Finasteride slows, and sometimes arrests totally, male-pattern baldness in young men or in older men who are beginning to lose their hair. It can be a very useful tool but doesn't work for all men; it works for about 60% of them.
What are the possible side effects from using Finasteride?
The side effects from using Finasteride mainly are a lowered libido, but also there is concern regarding conception of a child while the man is taking Finasteride, for fear of any distortion or problems with foetal development. Though many tests have been done and very thorough tests have been done, and it actually required 80 times the dose of Finasteride that the male takes that was given to rhesus monkeys in order to produce any foetal distortion. The concern is not a major one, but it is one that is taken fairly seriously, and men who are likely to be conceiving a child are advised not to take it.
How effective is Minoxidil?
Minoxidil is very effective in some males. In others it just doesn't work. It's the same with any drug, I think. It is very good at retaining hair growth, but actually producing new growth is a little less successful.
What are the side effects of Minoxidil?
Side effects of Minoxidil are really quite minimal. It is possible that there may be a lowering of blood pressure, but that of course is quite a healthy thing in most of us. There is also sometimes a possibility of scalp irritation by the substance itself. Perhaps it's an allergic reaction or just mild irritation, but that is the other thing that seems to be a problem on occasions.
What is female pattern baldness?
Female pattern baldness is a thinning of the hair initially on the frontal area and the crown of the head and it usually moves down the sides of the head - unlike male pattern baldness where the back and sides remain in place. In women, it is lost on the sides and on the top, but the back, or the occipital areas as it's called, usually remains dense.
What causes female pattern baldness?
Female pattern baldness is a sensitivity to the male hormone or the androgens within the females body. It is hereditary. It sometimes, not too often, affects women in their 20s and 30s, but more commonly affects women after menopause.
How can you treat female pattern baldness?
Female pattern baldness can be treated - arrested on some occasions actually - by taking certain types of HRT. One has to be very careful there, because some forms of HRT are known to actually perpetuate the condition. But specialists in hair and hair growth are able to treat with estrogens. With postmenopausal women, in some cases ministered is used and they can respond very well. This is often in conjunction with monoxide being applied topically.
Why do more men than women go bald?
Men go bald because of the testosterone. Women go bald because of their sensitivity to the male hormone. Most women aren't sensitive to it. Some are and, in menopause, they will lose hair but the pattern of loss is different.
Can I get a test to tell me if I'm going to go bald?
You can't really test as to whether you're going to go bald. If you are losing hair, there are tests that you can have which will tell you why you're going bald. These are usually blood tests.
Is hair loss hereditary?
Hair loss can occasionally be hereditary. It depends on many aspects but if the health conditions that cause hair loss are hereditary, we have such things as thyroid glands can upset the hair growth. Thyroid gland problems are often caused by hereditary conditions. They don't trigger themselves. It comes through the family quite often. But there are many forms of hair loss that are not hereditary.
Can hereditary hair loss be reversed or slowed down?
Hereditary hair loss in the form of male pattern baldness can be slowed down in certain circumstances, provided it's caught early in its falling stages. Once the hair is gone completely then nothing can be done. Where hair loss is caused by a female pattern, that can often be reversed. Other conditions that are causing hair loss, such as dietary conditions, can most definitely be reversed if the dietary condition is rectified.
Can other types of hair loss be reversed or slowed down?
Many forms of hair loss will actually reverse on their own. With those caused by a raised temperature, for example, the hair will be assaulted that day you have a raised temperature and, for various reasons, particularly the hair growth cycle, it's three months before the hair falls out. So it is then subsequently another three months before it regrows but it will do it spontaneously in many, many cases.
What is the most natural-looking hair transplant procedure?
The most natural hair transplant procedure is micro-transplants, which are commonly done for male pattern baldness but are used for other conditions such as scarring, even with beards, and for scarring of the scalp. These are just small transplants - one or two hairs at a time that are transplanted. They are very natural.
What is hair restoration surgery?
Hair restoration surgery is the transplantation of hair, or rather the redistribution of hair. Hair is removed from the dense area of the hair, particularly in male pattern baldness - the dense area being at the back of the head. That area is rarely lost in male pattern baldness. It is removed and transplanted to the top of the head. Having done so, because the hair follicle is also removed and transplanted, the hair will then grow into old age and grow grey and be permanent. It can be done in three forms. It can be micro-transplant surgery where hair is taken from a strip at the back of the head which is stitched and heals so that it is virtually not seen and then transplanted. It can be done with removal at the back of the head in cylindrical pieces of scalp removed and then the hair is transplanted into the top. The other form of hair restoration, which isn't really restoration but is cosmetically very acceptable, is where scarring has taken place on the head and you have got a bald patch, through an injury perhaps. It is possible to take a scalp section, remove a piece of scalp, and tuck in it effectively, so that you can remove the bald area and stitch the hair bearing areas together and effectively do away with the bald patch; but this only happens in small areas where there has been a scar.
When should someone consider hair restoration surgery?
You could perhaps consider hair restoration treatment, particularly in men; with women it's not usually done. With men it's more readily acceptable, in so far as it's easy to see or fairly easy to see how far that hair loss is likely to go. Therefore, the surgeon can predict whether or not the surgery is going to be satisfactory. In male pattern baldness, if the man isn't likely to be going extensively bald, hair restoration can be considered. The other reason for using surgery is where you have scarring, because in some cases it is possible to transplant the hair into a scar successfully. You can remove small areas of hair from the back of the head onto a nasty scar that's visible in the front of the head. For example, hair transplant surgery can happen perhaps after a car accident or something.
What developments are there with regards to hair loss and stem cell or gene therapy?
There is current research going on at the moment, which is likely to lead to help with baldness, where stem cells are concerned. That is promising, but it is still in the research stage. Stem cell research is very much in the cards at the moment as a means of helping male-pattern balding, particularly. Genetic inheritance and the effect of genes on your hair is possibly the most likely for actually producing a cure, because it can be done, hopefully, in the future, before the balding takes place rather than dealing with a bald head and then producing hair from it.
Are there any natural remedies to hair loss?
There are no natural remedies for hair loss, simply because hair loss has so many different causes. You have to diagnose the reason in order to treat the condition, and thus far we find no clinical trials that will prove that a natural remedy will cure all.
Why do natural remedies appear to work?
Natural remedies appear to work based on the fact that many, many people that suffer from a condition called Telogen effluvium. This condition is where you have some form of assault to the hair. It may be dietary, it may be having been unwell and due to the hair growth cycle, the hair will fall some 3 months after the assault so that the person who is suffering from sudden hair loss will not associate their hair loss with the assault 3 months previously - they will just see the hair dropping and they will panic. They will buy a natural remedy. The truth of the matter is that with Telogen effluvium, hair will spontaneously regrow. They're taking the natural remedy tablets at the same time that the spontaneous regrowth is taking place and so feel that the therapy they've been using is working.
