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Thanks for the video and your genuine care for people comes across... Well done..

Thank you for posting and hope you heal well and look forward to seeing your result come in.

Usually the scar will stretch in the first few months while the tensile strength is not there. We would look at scar position, width, laxity etc to all play a part in what to do but usually FUE or BHFUE into the scar is a safer option. Scars are avascular, i.e lacking in blood circulation, so the aim is to usually place at a lower density of 30 FU per cm2 to limit the competition for blood and ensure as much as possible good growth. A second pass may be needed or wear the hair longer to camouflage it. There are challenges of placing into scar tissue and I am sure this forum has some excellent and experienced clinics and also you may wish to look at SMP in synergy with FUE. @Raphael84 has now taken over from me on the forums and patients etc and will be the point of contact from here on for any who would like to be assessed by Dr.Bisanga and will continue now on behalf of BHR Clinic. I will be behind the scenes now more so but continue to work for the main man. Stay safe all and hope @rhal22 you can get the outcome you want. Thank you @JohnAC71 for your support and kind words and for adding me to this also and likewise for @Melvin PS. Adding grafts to it will being more blood and also warmth, colour change to it also as a nice side effect!

Thanks Raphael. Yes it is possible but just need to have all the ducks in a row! Thanks for updating this with this information.

Thanks John...have a great 2021!

Yes currently you can travel, you do need to do a PCR test and best to have it done 2 days prior to arrival time in Brussels and also fill in a patient locator form. Links below that may be helpful with regards to PCR and locator forms. https://diplomatie.belgium.be/en https://www.info-coronavirus.be/en/faq/ Passenger locator form. https://diplomatie.belgium.be/en/services/travel_to_belgium https://travel.info-coronavirus.be/public-health-passenger-locator-form PCR test is very important to be allowed in so make sure to schedule it to meet their requirement. All the best for your travel and surgery.

Here is an immediate post-op photo of the surgery and yes the patient will be having a second one to proceed as soon as possible to then continue on backwards. My own case is very similar and my photo (lower down) was from 10 years ago of how I looked prior to then more to the crown, and it came in very well and natural and was a long time ago. I am talking from personal experience also. Hope helps. First two photos are this patient, lower is mine from 10 years ago.

Unless a very tight closure then 10 days is fine usually unless specified to wait longer by the doctor who performed the surgery.

The primary for MSM is growth in general post-surgery alone and or with "FAST" shampoo also it does really help the patient come out of the shaved look faster. I don't think it would affect the dormant phase of the follicle and we would need to have a large amount of patients to trial to see but for sure it is something patients can take post surgery. They will be cutting their nails more also!

Yes , not a problem to keep some and you will see growth soon. MSM is really good for growth also and in-expensive. You will have great nails also!

Biotin is fine to take, you may wish to go lower on the dosages and monitor how it goes and also get it via foods. My brother is a nutritionist so I follow him but you may wish to see a specialist who can go over doses etc but it is rare to have issues with Biotin.

MSM can help speed up hair growth etc and you can take up to 3000mg daily. Either as a powder as I do or in tablet form it is easily bought. It is one of the items I recommend post-surgery in a tips document and here is the link to where you can buy if in the UK if you prefer online. MSM tablets Methylsulphonylmethane is a naturally occurring source of sulphur and known for speeding up hair, nail growth. https://www.naturesbest.co.uk/glucosamine-and-associated-products/msm-1000mg/

Thanks and no problem. Our approach is to harvest carefully and as fully as possible the donor region with a small punch and good pattern and then tap into body hair for a further donor source. It can as said here be mixed with scalp hair and for the most part look pleasing with the right mix and positioning of the body hair, i.e not to hair line etc. To exhaust a donor, let's say for argument 10,000 grafts taken, then you seek to improve the donor density by then placing beard/chest into it, you are in essence paying again for a surgery with it being done in two steps, take and replenish, rather than just take and place to recipient, but also placing into FUE scars is different to placing into a recipient hairless area. A recipient area for large surgery is mostly bald, you have clear visibility and are cutting recipient sites close together for placing and giving the illusion you want. To place in a donor you have to then inject all again a "haired" area that has had a lot taken and the toll could also be some miniaturisation there, so you are numbing again the area and placing then according to the previous FUE harvesting and not a usual pattern for placing, so a lot of injections over the whole area to treat and then matching the angles etc of the donor that changes significantly from zone to zone as does the hair groupings. You are also placing into scar tissue that in itself can have vascular and other challenges. Even if all this is done well, there is no guarantee it will look natural as colour, curl, coarseness etc all may be different, and in essence the recipient has had 10,000 grafts and you have in essence paid for a lot more due to the re-stocking. If one has a donor that is depleted through poor surgery then SMP may be a better option and as said, if it happens by error and not by design. So, it is expensive and no guarantee it will look any better or grow well and be better than a well planned and performed surgery that taps into both scalp and body hair. Some will combine FUT/FUE and then body hair and for me this is far better, more proven and cost effective than the other scenario We have from experience more used FUE to then go into FUT Strip scars and as necessity due to the patient having severe restrictions put upon them by the scar, but less so to FUE patients who have had poor surgery and as said, probably now SMP is a good option. Food for thought and by no means an exhaustive answer but aside from the sheer cost, it is not an approach we would go for.

I don't want to hijack this topic away from this patient but best to not over harvest the donor in the first place. We have placed body hair to scars etc but it is a very costly exercise to deplete a donor and then to replenish with body hair and for us not a primary approach. Use the donor wisely and within its limits and then tap into body hair as and when needed is the short answer.

Thank you for posting and as said here, nice clean work and healing very well.

Real cutting edge stuff, hopefully the days of the doctor saying simply "you have a good donor" are gone, as it is far too subjective and not science based. This is really where the industry needs to be heading with accurate, solid assessments that really give the patient the full picture to then make decisions. In 11 years I have met countless patients who have had "consultations" and even recently also, and I always ask them what were the results from it in terms of any actual readings, and nearly all will say no data was given, and a few will give figures that show the doc or rep were clueless like you have 40,000 grafts in your donor. There is tons of information out there on what surgery should look like but by and large not a lot on what a consultation should consist of, so it is good to see this standard set and hopefully this industry will become more science based with regards to this.

This usually kicks in a week after surgery if one suffers from it and can last a week and as you say is worse at night. This is occipital nerve pain and you can take pain medication for Neuralgia, apply cold aloe vera, massage etc and it will pass. Vit B tablets also help to heal nerves. This is common and I had it once personally badly in 2006 and no-body knew what it was so I researched and got informed and it is indeed in the post op document that we give people. Trust me it will pass and I have had it and dealt with many patients who had it and all of them had it pass exactly as I said. I don't post now but seeing you were in pain I wanted to chime in! Here is a quote from the document we provide as standard "Some may experience pain in the donor a week after surgery and pain killers, vitamin b tablets and applying cold aloe vera to the donor area will help relieve this. " Relax and do as above and you will heal okay!

Dear Bill, I truly wish you every happiness in this venture and you won't have a lack of knowledge for sure so can hit the ground running! Wishing you all the best. Steve

Exactly, it is more of an emotional upset. Take care and look forwards to seeing your result...

Firstly, congratulations on the surgery and sorry to see you have scratched some grafts out. Be careful with this and go and buy some washing up gloves that are nice, new and clean and put them on at night as they will cover your nails and give some extra protection but essentially it is best to keep away from the recipient area as much as possible. Don't beat yourself up as this happens and you are not the first nor the last person to do this. Try to be extra careful for the first few days and head scratching is so commonly done without even realising it. You have probably lost 5 to 10 grafts but not a big deal in the scheme of things and the blood on the skin will not effect the rest. If you can please make sure to be in contact with your advisor who had had surgery and many years experience, so he can answer you and detail on any concerns you have during this time and of course has all of the correspondence and details on your case also. All the best and hope you heal well and thanks for posting. PS Some prefer to wear mitts but I find washing up gloves easier to buy from any shop and as they are rubber then they are easy to clean, dry and re-use!

From the photos your nape has clearly thinned and probably you will have similar above the ears. Yes is it really important to get checked by someone who is thorough. I spoke to a UK patient recently who paid good money for a UK consultation and got zero empirical data and they didn't even recognise drastic retrograde alopecia. Another went to a London clinic and was told he had 40,000 grafts in his donor (no measurements done at all) ...laughable yet sad also. Considering a good donor is 180cm2, so it means he had the density of Chewbacca to have 40k...It amazes me how some have really no understanding at all as to what they are saying and pull figures out of the air. Thankfully times are changing and technology is here to be accurate and record images so it is not an opinion that is totally subjective but becomes more fact driven and an accurate assessment to then plan upon.

Congratulations, it is coming in really nicely for the timescale and big improvement since the last update...this will be a very nice and natural result. The donor is pristine also.

Beard and chest and approx a 50/50 split. These are single haired so it makes the outcome very good when we keep that in mind also.

Yes , me too..

This patient I believe had two surgeries elsewhere prior to us and thus we taped into body hair and use beard and chest. This video also details body hair usage that may be of interest as to our approach:-