newpatient99

Well you will have some growth for the next few months, most of the density will be achieved by month 9. The good news is if you were to do a touch up procedure, your final result will look amazing. Most doctors will either offer to do a touch up (if you need one) for free or give you a significant discount. 

A touch up is usually around 300-500 grafts. 

7 hours ago, Melvin-Moderator said:

You are correct, based on a study conducted by coalition surgeon Dr. Bernstein, after 9 days grafts are securely anchored in to the scalp. However, powerful UV rays can interfere with the healing process. Therefore, it’s good idea to wear a hat while outside for the first few months. 

https://www.bernsteinmedical.com/research/graft-anchoring-in-hair-transplantation/

 

Is 7 months ok to be outside in the sun without a hair for extended period of time? Especially here in Houston when it's like a 100 in the summer. 

OP, your 5 month results one of the best 5 month results I've ever seen! Looks better than a lot of 7 month results on here. You obviously picked a skilled doctor and took care of your grafts, so I'm sure you will have model looking hair in a few more months. 

One of the cleanest post ops I've seen. Take care of those grafts and you're going to be a very happy guy in a year!

14 minutes ago, made2care said:

From what I've read, the grafts are set 10 days post op. My grafts hairs are already shedding so I think a weave of some kind might have to be the route to go.

Good luck man. The only thing worse than balding is getting caught wearing a wig. 

7 minutes ago, made2care said:

Dress code will not allow caps. I'm not going to shave my head either!

That's unfortunate. I actually confided in my boss about the surgery and my insecurity and he let me wear a cap to work until I was able to grow my bangs out to cover it (I had 2000 grafts just to fill in my receding hairline). I've always worn caps so no one really questioned it. 

I'm going to assume a wig could damage the grafts. Do you usually wear caps? Don't know if your co-workers will be suspicious why you're suddenly wearing a cap all the time. 

You are willing to put your face on here, maybe you could shave your head and just let people know you had surgery? 

On 7/25/2018 at 10:59 PM, matt3480 said:

Whatever clinic said most patients only begin to sprout at 6 months is full of it, end of story. Most patients start sprouting at month 4 and if you have not started by 6 you are going to have a very very poor result.

I am telling you how my growth was based on my surgeries. Now again,  I am NOT talking about the crown as I did not have any work done in my crown and I have heard the crown indeed does takes longer to start growing. I am talking about the rest of the head. Sure, you may get a few hairs sprouting after 6 months, but I highly doubt you would notice much of a difference. The difference after month 6 comes from the new hair maturing and the shaft thickening (and, in my case, letting the transplanted hairs grow longer)....not from more sprouts coming in. Again, I felt 95% of my sprouts erupted by mid-way through month 5 to month 6 in all my surgeries. That isn't a bad thing....I grew in great on all my surgeries....the growth just came early.

Perhaps you're a fast grower. I spoke with the clinic again today and was told while there will be people sprout all their hair by month 6, it's also very common for the density to start coming in between month 8 and 12. I'll be going in for a check up next week but was told many patients experience around 40 percent density growth between month 8 and 12. I guess we'll have to wait and see. 

This patient, who is very satisfied with his final result, didn't his hair start filling in until month 9. 

On 6/6/2018 at 11:34 PM, Speegs said:

newpatient99 said:

So 5.5 month mark isn't even close to the final density?

Nope, month 9 is when most people actually start noticing the most cosmetic difference, and even then the next three to six months could offer even more density to come.

On 7/23/2018 at 2:18 AM, Markee said:

6 vs 12 Month results comparison video 

https://youtu.be/1kVaL8qfq20

Results may vary

 

So far I've been hearing conflicting stories. Some say at 6 months, all your hair has sprouted and some say at the 8-9 month mark, that's when you start getting density. Would love to hear more opinions on this matter. 

14 hours ago, made2care said:

Well, I did send him some pics about 2 weeks post op . We never got on the topic of his shampoo but I remember the techs told me to use baby shampoo. 

Dr Arocha responded to me sending pics 2 weeks post op and emphasized to continue placing the zinc ointment on recipient and donor site. On the recipient site, he told me to use ointment 2 hrs prior to shampooing, then while I'm shampooing, I must use a circular motion to gently remove scabs. As you can see from my previous posting, scabs are gone. 

Hope this helps

Oh ok. So the special shampoo provided wasn't necessary? 

On 7/6/2018 at 3:07 AM, matt3480 said:

I feel there is a lot of confusion sometime based on general guidelines regarding the whole “you should be at this percentage at this many months, etc.”

I have had a few HT’s and I felt that all my hair had sprouted by 5 months post op. I think you had that initial blast of density early as opposed to others who might get it a month or two later at 4-5 months. I wouldn’t be expecting another explosion of growth by any means. The hair should grow longer which will give it more of an illusion of density and may also mature into a coarser hair overall if you have that type of native hair. I have very fine hair so I actually lost a small bit of density once my hair matured because it started out coarser than my native hair initially.

Unless it’s the crown, you really are going to have 95 percent of your hair sprouting at 6 months.

When I stopped seeing growth from months 5 to 6, I called the doctor's office to address this concern and his assistant told me this was completely normal and most patients only begin to sprout at 6 months, and month 8 is when the density starts coming in. He sounded pretty genuine when he told me this. I just hit month 7 and I have noticed some growth in length and density for the last 3 weeks so I'm feeling optimistic. I don't know if 6 months for the sprouting to begin is the case for most patients. But I remember Dr. Diep mentioning in one of his videos, that most of his patients don't start spouting until 4 to 6 months. 

What did Dr. Arocha say regarding the shampoo you were given but couldn't bring back with you?

^

When I spoke with Dr. Arocha's assistants regarding the spray, I was told they carry the spray but only less than 1% of their patients actually use it and it's completely unnecessary which is why they didn't even offer it to me.

9 hours ago, made2care said:

I was, however, since I had to board a flight back home, the special shampoo had to be left behind. I was instructed to rinse my hair daily using baby shampoo with no scrubbing. As far as a spray, there was no mention of that in their post op instructions but I believe on the 3rd day, I can apply a zinc based ointment which is also used to treat donor scar site. Not relevant to your question but I might add that I tend to swell pretty horrifically in the forehead after these surgeries. Nothing helps, ice, elevation all to no avail so I'm currently dealing with that which is a little inconvenient since I can't go anywhere until it subsides but hey, a slight sacrifice for new hair so no complaints on this end, just mild venting to get me through .

Excuse my ignorance but why couldn't you take the special shampoo with you?

I also had a HT with Dr. Arocha in January. Glad to hear that I wasn't the only one that wasn't offered the spray, however I wasn't even offered the special shampoo lol. When I scheduled my surgery, I was emailed post op instructions that mentioned a post op kit that included a special shampoo and a spray. Right after my surgery, I was still out of it from the meds so I wasn't really in the right mind to ask questions, but the only post op instructions was to not get my hair wet, come back the next day for a check up and to be shown how to wash my hair.

The next day when I came in for the check up, I asked about the shampoo and spray but was told I wouldn't need it and was given ointment to apply to the donor area. When I asked what kind of shampoo should I use, they told me any shampoo was fine. I only used baby shampoo because just about every doctor on this forum recommended it.

I had swelling too, but that was my fault because I would end up sleeping flat on my back in the middle of the night after trying to sleep sitting up. But the swelling went away after a couple of days.

^

Congratulations on your surgery. Were you provided with any kind of post op kit that includes a spray and shampoo? 

This weekend would hit 6 months and 2 weeks for me and there has been almost no growth from month 5 to now after such a promising start. I spoke with the doctor's assistant about this and he assured me this was normal and that I wasn't even supposed to start sprouting until 6 months since I didn't do PRP and I'm actually ahead of schedule if I started sprouting at 3 months. Not supposed to sprout until 6 months seems off compared to other progresses I've seen on here, however I'm feeling better about this since I have faith he knows what he's talking about and he sounded pretty confident. Anyone else in the same boat and can shed some light?

Man I’m having this same issue, came outta the gate hot with new hairs popping at 2-3 months, now for the last month and a half I haven’t seen any new hairs. I know it’s early but just wanting to see anything new would be sweet. Anyone else have this happen them?

Glad to hear I'm not the only one, especially since we both went with reputable doctors. Guess we can only wait.

They could be growing at the same rate but it maybe less blatant due to the contrast. For example lets say you shave your head and your hair grows by 2cm you will think wow its growing fast because you can see the difference from bald to hair. However when it grows by another 2cm you might not think the growth has slowed down because it isn't completely bald and you can't clearly see how much it has grown. It's kind of hard to explain if you get what i mean.

Hopefully. I just hope it wasn't due to two assistants having different skill levels when they planted the grafts.

Nope, month 9 is when most people actually start noticing the most cosmetic difference, and even then the next three to six months could offer even more density to come.

Thanks! Was it at month 9 when you started to notice the biggest change in your hair after your surgery?

So he hasn’t taken dutasteride for 3 years right? I think his hair loss is very minimal, appears to be more of a matured hairline. I highly doubt he’ll ever go Norwood 6 bald he’s almost 40 already.

His hairline is great for a 40 year old, a 1500 fue procedure would make his hair god level! Plus he wears his hair down a lot so he could easily cover the ugly phase.

Everyone grows differently, telling you exactly what to expect month to month is impossible.

 

Generally, after about a calendar year you can accurately gauge how well you're going to grow, sometimes it even takes up to 18 months, but most are able to have a good indication about the outcome of the surgery at the one year mark.

 

Anything before then is case by case with each and every patient.

 

The less than 6 month mark requires a lot of patience as it is generally the ugly duckling phase for most.

So 5.5 month mark isn't even close to the final density?

Growth can come it dribs and drabs and I wouldn't worry at this early stage. Five months counts as early. There is no special shampoo as such. I know that my doctor instructs using baby shampoo, as it is mild. The main thing is not to apply too much pressure in the first couple of weeks, and as I'm sure you've followed that instruction then I'm sure you haven't done any damage.

Yes, I was extra conversative with post op care. Didn't touch my head for the first 5 days and would only pat dry my hair after showering for the first 2 months. It's weird because my 3 month growth was better than most of the pics on here but than my 5 month growth seemed to be slower than those same pics lol

I also forgot to mention I was not given any kind of spray or special shampoo to take home after the surgery. When I called about this, I was told it wasn't needed. Hopefully I wasn't a rushed patient.

Hey everyone, had my first HT earlier this year, at about 2.5 months, I started seeing the new hairs coming in and between months 3 and 4, I was on my way and was making great progress, my growth at that point looked to be faster than the average patient here based on the pics posted. I'm coming up on 5 and a half months in a few days and unfortunately, since month 4, I've had very little to almost no growth. I would say in the last month, I've had maybe less than 20 percent of what I had the previous month. Should I be worried or is this normal?

I didn't take pics of my progress because I wanted to live my life and not let the waiting game hold me back from doing so. Everything (according to the doctor) looked amazing immediate post op and 1 week check up. The doctor I went to has a great reputation on here so at that time, I wasn't worried about it, but now that I think about it, I am slightly concerned because I was the second surgery of the day and the doctor's only involvement was the hairline incision. The extracting of the grafts was done completely alone by an assistant and then the placing the grafts were done by two different assistants. At the time, I wasn't sweating about it, because I just assumed that was normal. Can someone shed some light on this?

A few other key points...

- I was very careful when it came to post op care. I was told to wait 2 weeks before working out and I waited 3 weeks. I was told to not let use the shower head for 5 days, I waited 10 days.

- About 90 percent of my new hairline as of right now is about half a cm higher than my post op hairline. On the right side of my hairline, there are a few new hairs coming out exactly where the post op hairline was, however the rest of my hairline is about half a cm too high. Like I said, the placing of the grafts were done by 2 different assistants, so I don't know if that has something to do with it.

- There's a lot of hairs that sprouted at 3 months that haven't grown at all since then.

Maybe I'm worried over nothing and this is completely normal? Hopefully at month 6, everything will be back on track like before.