odlantern

Hi PulpedFiction1, When I first consulted with Dr. Cohen, the price he gave me was quite high, just over $8 a graft. He mentioned that the robotic FUE costs more than the manual FUE because they have to pay a certain percentage of the procedure to the makers of the robot, but that it was worth it due to the usually higher yield. He claimed that he put in 1100 grafts instead of the planned 1000 because I had a higher yield than usual during the extraction. I don't know what the exact percentage was. I was very aggressive with negotiations because I just couldn't see paying that much. In the end, I got a little over $2 per graft off of the price. Now that my hair is getting thicker, I'm really liking the results. At close to month 5 it now seems to be growing much faster. It is definitely dense enough. The open question is whether I want to move the hairline down further in the future. I will probably end up doing that in a year or two. Dr. Cohen really seems to want me to come in so he can take pictures and inspect the results. He has contacted me several times. ~David

I would rather not say an exact number, but it was somewhere around the mid thousands. Hopefully I didn't get ripped off.

Those look like fantastic results. Congrats!

Pulpedfiction1, if you don't mind me asking, how many grafts did you get in each of your 3 surgeries? I tried looking this up in your profile but didn't have any luck.

I don't think I will really mind going in for a second surgery down the road. I would rather take things slowly than try to fix everything at once. Based on the advice on this forum I may end up going for another 1000 or so grafts in a year and a half.

Based on the research that I did, I initially thought I would need around 2K grafts. I spoke to several surgeons however, and they all gave me numbers in the 1.2K to 1.5K range. I went to Dr. Cohen in the end both because of this site's recommendation of him, and my consultation with him directly. In the end, we decided to go with a somewhat conservative approach and just fill in the areas without lowering the hairline below what I have in the middle front. Dr. Cohen said lowering the hairline would be expensive in terms of the number of grafts needed and he didn't think I would need to do this. It would take around 1K grafts to fill in the area, but probably 1.5K more to lower the hairline. Money was a limiting factor for me also because I just paid off all of my student loans and worked hard to get completely debt free (I plan on remaining debt free for the rest of my life). Depending on how things look at the year or year and a half mark, I may go in for a second surgery. Even at 4 months with such a conservative approach, I look so much better. I constantly get comments, especially with people I haven't seen in a while. Not that it matters much, but Dr. Cohen said he actually implanted around 1100 grafts because he said the extraction rate was much better than usual. It is shocking how expensive these procedures are. 4K to 5K grafts is well into the tens of thousands of dollars unless these people are getting amazing deals. Thanks for the info and advice everyone. ~odlantern

This is depressing to hear. I don't understand why Dr. Cohen would mislead me like this. He gave me every indication that 1000 would be plenty.

I think it was about a month for me as well. I ended up pushing the surgery back another month because I had a business trip coming up. I work from home most of the time so I was able to get back to work right away. I just worked from home for about a week.

The cost was higher than a few other places I looked into, but I figured it would be worth it because I wanted to go to someone who I thought could give me good results. I was able to negotiate a couple dollars per graft off of the price to get it closer to someone like Bosley. I guess I just have to wait and see what the final results look like to really know.

After the surgery (Dr. Cohen called me at night to see how I was doing), I mentioned needing more grafts during a second visit, and he said I should be fine with the grafts I got. Because of the type of hair I have, he thinks the results will look great. He doesn't think I will need a second visit. Given what I see so far, I feel confident that he is right. The hairs that have grown in are currently very thin, but after time, the thickness should match the rest of my hair (remember that I'm only at 4 months and still have a long way to go). He said he placed the hairs at a very high density, more densely than usual. If I do go for a second surgery, it will be to lower the hairline more, which is not something I'm sure I actually want to do. Dr. Cohen said this might look unnatural/artificial. I don't see what motivation Dr. Cohen would have to lie about this. Wouldn't he want more money from me? It's funny, people who I run into say I look so much better and 'healthier'. They wonder if I lost weight or something (I'm at the same weight). They can tell there is something very different about me, but can't quite figure out what it is. I've also noticed a _huge_ difference dating. Every little difference helps, because I have spent much of my life extremely embarrassed about the way I look (long story, and not just because of the hair). ~odlantern

As promised, here are a couple of quick pictures I took this morning. At 4 months, I was told to expect around 25% of final growth which seems about right. I just got a fairly short haircut, so the hairline can be seen pretty clearly. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

Hi VikingsFan40, So far I am happy with the results. It has been 4 months since the surgery and there is already significant growth. I will post pictures later. I have been using Rogaine on the area 2x a day starting two weeks after the surgery. Pulpedficiton1, I had the same concern. I guess I still do. I was afraid that 1000 grafts would be too few, and maybe it is. Price was a limiting factor for me. I also wanted to be a bit conservative and subtle though, and not have it be obvious for people who know me that I had the procedure done. If I want to do another procedure, I could always do one later to lower the hairline further. I thought Dr. Cohen and their staff were very nice and realistic about the results I might achieve. Because I have very think hair, they said I didn't need as many grafts. We'll see. ~odlantern

Just a quick post: 2 days out from the surgery and there is no pain or swelling. A lot of the redness is gone. The donor and recipient areas are slightly itchy.

This is probably a dumb question, but how do I change the title of this entire thread? I think it would be good to include Dr. Cohen's name in the title in case people want to search for results with his work.

Day 2, no pain. I was given pain medication but didn't need to take it. I slept fine last night. I am concerned that 1000 grafts may not have been enough. I'm somewhat worried my hairline will be too high or not dense enough. I normally have very thick wavy hair, but it looks thing and stringy in this picture due to it not being washed in a while and the graftcyte solution I had to put on it.