Happy

this sums it all up nicely: people are different including different taste and preferences. we live in a world of variety as a natural result. and that's wonderful. at least i wouldn't want to change it.

hello linchpin, good stuff again - it all sounds very authentic and as such quite reassuring of the doc's and clinic's reputation! in particular i like that they seem to be very transparent in what they do, not just with the pre-op assessment, but also during the surgery. you suggested to contact the clinic and ask for dr tsolani's advice so that he could clarify any outstanding issue. since you know him personally, would it be possible for you to invite him to this forum to publicly clarify further questions that people here have? it's not just about his special fue approach and efforts about minimising trauma, but also about many other interesting things; eg. his experience with super mega sessions; or findings of his research work... i am sure that his contributions would be highly appreciated by the whole ht community here. ps: did you have at any stage any post-op pain or/and swelling of the head including the famous boxer look?

actually, you are right. it's just a matter of time when people find the info. and so far my understanding about a forum has been to simply shortcut this process.

Bill, this is the only reason why i helped, invested time for research and provided info that was asked for. since i didn't want to spend any unnecessary additional time i simply kept it to the point and copy and pasted the links that i found - this way people can find out more about them if they want to. eg. darren didn't seem to be able to find this info himself. this has nothing to do with promoting links.

this article was published in 2007 of course not here in this forum but somewhere else (forgot to jot down the weblink). for clarity reasons the "quotation style" has been applied. so, here we go and have some fun! in other words, according to bernstein it is rather the norm that examination of donor miniaturisation is normally not done!! at least back in 2007. that's what we also assumed. strange that despite this crucial factor miniaturisation doesn't play that important role for many surgeons in the pre-op assessment. guess why ;-) but here comes some more interesting info: and i suppose what bernstein is now saying shows the whole gamut of trickiness when it comes to making a final decision about the suitability of a candidate: well, now we know more. or maybe not.:confused:

blake, thanks for sharing your views and which, generally speaking, make sense: miniaturised hair is definitely a sign of a weakened hair which might fall out sooner or later, hence not a good bloke for a transplant. however, in my view the crucial question still remains: up to which stage is the degree of miniaturisation in the donor area still acceptable? i don't think it's as straightforward as your last post suggests, blake. i have just done some research into this topic and found one quite interesting article by dr. bernstein talking about evaluating a person for a ht. see my following post including sections of this article:

linchpin, when watching one of the clinic's videos about extracting follicles via fue, i had the feeling that they used an electric device and which is normally not recommended by other top notch fue surgeons who prefer the manual approach. what was your experience on that?

i was just wondering whether starting your ht with fue has also to do with the tricho closure. because somehow i remember slightly that with this special closure technique usually many hairs would be lost/damaged unnecessarliy if only the strip was applied. maybe i am wrong.

many thanks first of all for providing so much invaluable details. this really does sound like a highly professional approach instead of just applying a ballpark figure. there is only one thing which i am not quite sure whether the doc also told you - how many miniaturised hairs your donor had: in another thread i raised the question about whether miniaturised hair will get transplanted or not - you know, this is all the thin, weak hair which is already in the process of becoming terminal. so, when i was asking about the percentage of miniaturisation i meant the proportion between healthy and miniaturised hair in the donor area. eg.: if your doc measured a density of 100 fu's per cm2 in your donor area but noticed that 20 fu's per cm2 were already miniaturised, then this would be a percentage of 20%.

excellent response as usual, linchchpin. the same goes with toma and your valid point! with g spot we shouldn't forget where he is coming from. with all due respect to his contributions, but after all as the shapiro coordinator he has a vested interest in directing candidates more towards his own, probably high priced clinic whereas you guys have the privilege to provide rather an unbiased view based on facts.

sorry, i still don't understand. what you are saying is that whenever people publish a link here then this will be removed because of being a potentially promotional link. fair enough if this is the general policy of the forum. if this is really the case, why does this forum then still consist of published links? ps.: i understand that promotional links can be a nuisance for the public. however, people nowadays aren't that that stupid anymore not to find out easily. as for your advice, the whole point in publishing links (and not use eg. pm) in my view is to make it public since other people might also be interested in the info.

thanks for your advice, will try and contact the doc to get a professional response. and if we are really lucky, then some of his words might even get published here without being censored in the first place because of promotional reasons. let's see.

hello bill, i am quite confused about your advice in terms of keeping promotional links off: darren and then Future_HT_Doc asked other members to chip in. as a matter of providing help, i spent some time doing research on the doc and the clinic. the relevant results that i finally found i then copied and pasted in my reply. so, this has nothing to do with promoting any links but simply with helping other people here. otherwise, i suppose that every other link that is being published in this forum needs to be removed as well.

since nobody has provided a satisfying answer to my initial question, i was wondering whether this device exists at all. and in case it does, whether it is being used at all. would anybody here in the forum be able to ask dr cohen and who, as far as i know, has mainly contributed to developing this device. maybe he is able to answer the questions and elaborate on the trichometer.

hello all, i suppose that with the miniaturisation process of hair it's not a black or white situation - in other words, whether you have miniaturised hair or not. i guess it's rather a matter of degree as to what percentage of donor hair is miniaturised and whether there is a certain acceptable threshold up to which a candidate is considered being a suitable candidate. maybe i am wrong. hopefully some docs can chime in and give professional advice.

in one of the other threads a very interesting issue was raised: miniaturised hair in the donor area is not a very good foundation for a ht. hence my question: does miniaturised hair get transplanted or not, in particular with a strip procedure?

can you give some examples when (in terms of percentage of miniaturised hair) patients are not good candidates for ht?

donor density you wrote that the doc would be capable of planting 100 grafts per cm2 and which is great if, as a patient you have got this amount of donor capacity in the first place. anyway, i am wondering whether the doc also placed grafts between your thinning hair and what his new techniques look like in order to minimise shock loss. by the way, would it be possible if you took some pics so that people here can literally see what's been going on. it definitely would be appreciated in particular by other potential candidates who also might be considering taking the plunge and to try this clinic out.

number of harvested grafts i understand that your doc got more than 3300 grafts out of the strip and which is quite a lot. what was the size of the strip (length and width)? and did you get a breakdown how many single-, double-, triple- and quadruple grafts were harvested?

size of the implant sites i understand that the doc is the only one who makes the implant sites. and you wrote that the doc uses different sizes of punches to accommodate the various sizes of the grafts. i had a look at their website including a video showing the making of the implant sites but could only see the doc using just one and the same tool throughout the entire procedure. did you notice that he changed the punch or not?

choice of clinic i understand that you did a lot of research before you made the decision to go exactly for this clinic. what was the particular reason why you didn't choose eg. the world renowned clinic by dr humanyan from pakistan and who offers much better rates in doing a strip procedure?

donor density you mentioned that the doc had a special device to measure your donor density. was it a densitometer or something else? and did you see anything showing up on screen? it would be great if you could elaborate on that also including your donor density. did the result also include eg. the average size of your grafts? or the percentage of miniaturisation?

pre-surgery consultation and ht planning before you flew to georgia i suppose all your pre-op consultation with the doc was done via email and maybe phone conversations. i am wondering whether you were provided with a donor management plan beforehand and how it looked, just in case.

great response, thanks again linchpin! i've noticed there are further questions which i hope you don't mind answering. to make it easier for you i have divided them into the following posts:

hello talizi, can you provide more information about your patents in anesthetics and in suture closing methods and how they are different or better compared to eg. trichophtyic closure? also, it would be good to see results using fue.