saska1209

I really wish you see ur crown hair grown much earlier than 18 months. When did you see sprouting in the crown? Did you use minoxidil over transplanted crown area after your HT?

PostDoc, were you on Minoxidil before you HT as well or you started only after your HT to speed up the growth of transplanted follicles? By 3 weeks now, I have lost more than 50% of the transplanted hair so I'm not counting that I would retain those without shedding and I dont mind if they all shed. But if I can get early growth with Minoxidil then I'd give it a try especially when the area is crown and crown seem to grow slower.

Thanks Janna, I understand the best time to start with meds is before HT. But I seem to have lost that chance since I have already been through 2 HTs. The last one being 3 weeks ago. But still at stage NW5V, I feel I might save some hair if I start with meds even now. Janna, do Dr. Ron Shapiro or Dr. Paul Shapiro advise patients to start with Finasteride and Minoxidil after HT (in case they weren't on the meds before HT, for whatever reason)?

How slow is the growth in the crown as compared to frontal third? Is the difference weeks, a month or many months?

Thanks Bobilero and PostDoc for chipping in. How about the initial shedding due to minoxidil? Do the hair shed only in applied area or the whole scalp?

Nobody to give opinion on this?

Hi, I had 1900 FUE grafts HT for my "crown" 2 weeks ago. I have couple of questions: 1. Regarding the common belief that Minoxidil speeds up growth (i.e. help stimulate the new follicles to start growing a little faster): How true is it? 2. Shedding is commonly experienced after starting using Minoxidil. My question is, does the shedding happen in the area where it is applied or all over scalp? For instance, if I apply to my transplanted area (crown) only, then would I experience the initial shed in the rest of the scalp as well? On a side note, I'm also planning to start Finasteride in a week. And, btw, I haven't used either Minoxidil or Propecia before, so these would be my first experience with these two.

blkblk Good question. And its just a paranoia, that I'm having I'm sure. However, I'm still interested in HT gurus responses of how they coped with sunlight coming indoors (or if they didn't anything about it at all)?

Thanks Spex for the encouraging response. Really appreciate it, mate! One thing I still wonder, that how do other guys who get HT, protect themselves from sun when indoors (e.g. at home), especially, those living in South and Southeast (For instance, the sunshine state Florida etc.)?

ytoday I hope you are experiencing great results! Did the sunlight coming through glass windows (plus curtain) had any adverse effects on your results?

There is something that has been helping me having a paranoia I've been reading different posts here about the exposure to sun after HT. Though the majority consensus is that one need to avoid DIRECT exposure to sunlight, but what bothers me is some of the examples given by posters may or may not be considered direct sunlight. Without going through the specifics of what other posters have said regarding it, here is my situation which is building a paranoia in my head: I'm 4 weeks post HT and I have been staying during whole this time (thanks to a month of vacations from work). During this time I have been staying inside the whole except when I have had to do some gocery shopping, during which time I always wore my bandana (except one time but that was when I went for a walk after 2 hours of the sunset, so I believe that shouldn't be a problem). And during the last month the sun has been out perhaps 3-5% of the time so it's been cloudy almost the whole time. However, when inside I have been sitting next to the window (having curtain which has been down the whole time) and sometimes (that 3-5% of the time) I could see the sun out but I believe the sun didn't hit my window directly. But I have been worrying that I have made a mistake by sitting next to window. How a catastrophic do you think it could have been for the grafts survival? Any thoughts, especially by those who did something like this and didn't see any problem with their results? Thanks in advance!!

Ok, great. I'm almost a month post HT so I'll be alright then. One more question: Is it OK to wear beanie on top of Toppik or Dermmatch? I know it will mess up the beanie but I'm OK with that. But would it affect the scalp or grafts in any way?

Hi, There are quite a few posts regarding hats after HT, but almost all of them discuss baseball cap type hats. I was wondering if it is and how long after is it Ok to wear winter hats. For example something like these:

I am at Norwood 5 stage and moving towards Norwood 6. I was wondering if its late to start Finasteride now?

Yes, I was referring to the transplanted hairs growing before the initial shed. Any other opinions from other people around here? Or any other indications?

And the early initial growth?

Yes, I know that it takes from anywhere 3 to 12 months to see real results. But I was wondering if there are any *indications* during the first few days or weeks post HT that the HT is successful? For example, is the initial growth of transplanted grafts (before they shed and go into resting phase) an indication of the success?

I was wondering what are the initial indications (few days) that the HT is successful (especially in FUE case)?

kman001, I agree with aaron1234 that your hair looks really good and a bit of more length and they must look perfect. BTW, in your pictures it seems that your hair look quite curly, have you considered (or talked to any physician) about FUE on curly hair? What is your information regarding this?

Thanks mattj for clarification. Now that FU taken from donor area has all the genetic information to grow when transplanted anywhere on the body,...then it makes me wonder: Why in most (or perhaps all) of the cases the yield of transplanted hair is not 100%? Especially in FUE case the yield is even lower. I would appreciate if some of the HT physicians on this forum contribute to this topic. Thanks.

Do you mean it won't grow if the transplanted follicle is inserted into recipient area where there wasn't any hair before?

Last week I visited HT surgeoun and among many other questions I asked the doctor: How do they know there was a hair earlier (at recepient area) where they transplant new graft? The doctor replied, it does't matter if the incison at recepient area had a hair graft earlier before hair loss started because its the donor information that is crucial for the transplanted hair to grow. As an exmaple he said,..if he takes a hair from the safe zone of the back of the head and transplant it on palm of hand or nose,...it would also grow, even though those areas never had hair. How true is this?

Thanks guys for the responses. jfables, where and which doctor did you get your HT done? And how many grafts were transplanted in each session and how much (%age) yield did you get? Thanks

I'm considering my options and two HT surgeons are on my list with whom I would like to have FUE. One major difference between the two is that one of them uses manual punch for making incisions at the donor area. What punch tool (manual or motorized) is considered to be more successful? What are the benefits and drawbacks of each of them?

I have understood that it could be a bit more difficult. Luckily my hair are not as curly as American African (by luckily I mean that its more favorable for FUE than if they were as curly as African Americans). I was wondering what is the yield rate in general for FUE? And how much could it increase if the hair are curly?