My initial thought on this was to not wash my hair at all for at least 2 or 3 days to allow my grafts to stabilize. However, after reading a study (I believe from Dr. Bernstein et al) that suggested scab formation could lead to graft lost, I was at a stand still - wash early and aggressive or wait ? Well, what ive learned is that the grafts are pretty tight in there initially but still potentially dislodgable with enough force. And after seeing how aggressive the hair transplant assistants/techs were with their drying, I realized that these initial hair should not just fall off with light water pressure.
So here is what I did: I bought a sprayer with normal saline to keep my recipient area nice and moist. The key thing is to set it mist mode, spray from afar to keep the area moist without generating so much pressure to dislodge the graft. By doing this, i theorize that it would keep a constant flow of moistness that would prevent any ingredients for scab formation to build up. I did this every 30 mins or so. I started to do the cup shampoo thing on day 2 post op with continued mist spraying with normal saline in between my shampoos.
I had excellent results, I barely had any scab formations. Likely from the frequent flow of normal saline through my scalp preventing a scab from forming one. Or maybe it was the shampooing?
another added benefit is that the mist spray was excellent for treating recipient area itching
What do you guys think?