Friedman

Can surgeones actually do anything about hair pointed in the right direction? Or is this just a hazard of the business?

This actually looks like a great result to me. I don't think people should go into a hair transplant surgery expecting better. It looks thick enough, does it not? I think those pics where the OP parts his hair right by the hairline will look thin on anyone. What matters is how you look with the hair as you go out in public.

I did consider it, but I don't want to take a pill that messes with my hormones. From my reading, I do agree it does appear to be safe and have minimal side effects in most, but not all men. At present, I'm going to stick with these four treatments: (1) hair transplant, (2) Rogaine, (3) micro-needling, (4) PRP. Seems there are high-quality RCT results in favor of all four. If these don't work, or if my transplant looks funky, I think I might just go bald...

Ok, Here are my pics after 2 1/2 months, roughly. I've been hitting the Rogaine, PRP, and microneedling pretty hard... At this point, I do feel I'm still a few weeks away from looking as good as I did pre-Op. Some of the new hairs do seem to have grown, and I'd say my hair looks a bit stranger than it did before, and my hair has darkened a bit. Now it's just a waiting game, of course, for my old hairs on to to add length and for the new hair to come in. My donor area looks totally fine already. I got sunburned, and that is starting to peel, so I also have some white flakes in my scalp.

OK bros (and broettes), here are my pics a bit more than one month out. My hair is slowly regrowing, and the transplanted hair is slowly falling out. I've also had my 2nd PRP injection (did one with the surgery), and have started back up on the Rogaine for the past couple of weeks. Scars in the back are not so visible...

Yeah, this is pretty amazing. How does the donor area look? I now wish I'd have done more than 2,700, as it looks like you had more hair than me to begin with... I'm two weeks out, so now just have to wait.

^I will hope. The doctor told me there were a lot of double and triple grafts. Who knows, though, they might tell everyone that... and does that mean I had 80 triples, or 800? Anyway -- another comment. I am two weeks out now, and the top of my head (recipient area) still doesn't have full feeling restored.

^Hey Wylie, so, you think it's obviously a smart idea to distrust what my doctor, who is a smart guy and who I trust, recommends, and instead go for what some guy wrote on the internet? A downside of this site is that there are many paid forum advocates. The good thing is that they are up-front about this. So that means taking the advice of someone paid to steer me to a certain clinic, vs. my doctor? Granted, I was annoyed at several things, but mainly the particular doctor I dealt with was incompetent, but the transplant was performed by the better doctor's staff. You might be right I won't get a full head of hair, and won't get the density in the front, especially in places where I had no/little hair before. However, I also thought that, at least with Rogaine in my hair, in my own view at least I didn't look *that* terrible before. I'm not starting at a point of no hair. I've always had thin hair, and actually don't want to rob too much from the donor area. If I were to do it again today, I would probably go for 3,500/4,000 instead of 2,700, but I'll count this as a success if I see substantial noticeable improvement. I'm not that keen on the idea of robbing another 1,500 hairs from my donor area, but of course I'll need to see what both areas look like in six months...

Good question. I wish I'd have discovered this forum before I had surgery... I'd have had more grafts for sure.

Yeah, thanks. I think I'll live with the scabs for a few more days. Whenever I try to remove them, often the hairs come with them. At 12 days, it feels too early'ish to lose my transplanted hair. I actually don't have a work function for 14 more days, by which time I'd imagine the shedding will already be advanced. I can go to town on the scabs just before that.

Is it that obvious he should do a 2nd procedure? A hair transplant surgery is quite invasive -- I just had one. Your scalp hurts like hell for a week. Many people have a red scalp for months. You have to shave completely, and it takes months to regrow. Takes 6 months to really see the results. Sometimes the way to win wars is by not fighting them. Anyway, what is the OPs goal with his hair? Is it to be more successful in business? Because if he does another surgery, he'll have to take time off from work, and will will look worse in front of clients for a period of time, and he'll have to spend his hard-earned money on surgery. Is it to be more successful with women? Because he might find he can do just fine with his hair as-is.

Hmm... I think I'll wait until day 14 at least to scrub harder in the shower... Or it seems like no harm to wait for the week 3 shedding, at which point the scabs, attached more to my hair than my scalp at this point, shed by themselves. Also, I think you should seriously consider *not* having another hair transplant operation. They are expensive, a hassle, the operation sucks, and the effects are not permanent in any case. All surgeries are invasive, and they take a toll. Your hair looks pretty good, and better than before.

Whoah, no scabs after two weeks. How did you accomplish that? I had surgery a week after you, but I still have basically all the scabs on the top of my head. I'm afraid of removing them for fear they'll take the newly implanted hairs with them... Although, it seems others look more like you.

I guess, one thing I already wish is that I would have done closer to 3,500 or 4,000 grafs. Why do if not going for a full head of hair?

I actually think his hair shows remarkable improvement. That a lot of posters consider this a failure suggests that the standard results are very good, which makes me hopeful. One question for the OP -- I'm now 12 days post-op, and I still have a bunch of scabs in my recipient area attached to my new hairs. When I look at your day 10 pick, I didn't see any. How did you get this out of your scalp without removing your new hair too early? Chears Bro, Friedman

OK, here is the 12thd day post-op. For me, around day 7 was when the pain in my donor area really started to subside. The donor area is still visible, but less noticeable than before. I still have scabs on the top of my head -- i've been picking at them too much. When I do, the hair falls out, so I'm naturally worried this will make the results go away, even though I'm now beyond the 10 day mark. Thus my strategy is still to try not to touch at all. Nevertheless, I'm well on my way to having my surgery not be noticeable. @Wylie. Agreed. My big mistake was just going with my doctor's recommendation, and just going with the clinic he recommended rather than with the exact surgeon. On the other hand, I think, if my new hair actually grows, my new hairline will be roughly fine. Also, the incompetent doctor didn't even touch my head during the actual procedure, as far as I know. Apparently all the technicians there have been working there 10 years. At least, that's what they told me. If this doesn't work, or looks bad, I'll probably go bald rather than for round 2.

Just as an FYI, here's what I look like 6 days post-OP. I'd say my head/scalp is still quite uncomfortable. Hurt worse yesterday, a bit better today. I can see it's going to be a long, slow process. My scalp is still filled with dried blood. I'm afraid of taking it off as my transplanted hair probably hasn't set yet. FYI -- the Talizi clinic said my pain was normal, that there was no infection, and that I should simply take ibuprofen. For those who have done surgery, how/when did you remove the blood from your recipient area? (that couldn't come off soon enough for me...)

Thanks for this. This study makes it sound like aloe vera might be beneficial, but the results are suggestive rather than conclusive. 12 patients isn't that big of a sample size. "Visual analogue scale scores after wound dressing for the aloe vera and placebo groups were 17.18 ± 13.17 and 18.63 ± 11.20, respectively. No statistical significance was found between groups." And this "Three studies of burn wounds demonstrated improved epithelization and one did not. The split-thickness skin graft donor-site study indicated that wound healing time for the control group was significantly different from that of the aloe vera and placebo groups. The healing rate was not statistically different between groups."

Thanks, I'll try it. It could be soothing. However, I thought the scientific consensus on Aloe Vera is that it doesn't really do much? For me, I always thought cuts heal much faster with Neosporin. Was surprised this wasn't recommended.

I see... I didn't fully realize what I got myself into... 4 months is a really long time.

Hello, now I'm about 5 days post-ops, and while I'd say the first 3 days went smoothly, my donor area now hurts a bit more than it did 1-2 days ago. I'm a bit worried about an infection. Admittedly, I probably picked at the donor area too much, as much as I've tried not to touch it. Any suggestions from those who have been through the process? Of course I emailed the clinic for advice...

Wow, the recipient area is still quite red after 2 and even 3 months. I just had my transplant 5 days ago, so this worries me...

I chose them because my doctor recommended them, although I didn't do a ton of research. I also had a strong desire to visit Georgia at some point, so just trusted him. I should have done more homework! So, in May of 2017, here is what my scalp looked like before any treatment (the one with several red dots on my head; bottom pic). Second, I'll post a pic of my scalp after one year of Rogaine plus a dermaroller, with also several months of PRP (top pic in fact). I saw some improvement (I think?), but definite improvement when I put Rogaine in my hair, which automatically makes it look thicker, independent of any real effect on growth. (This effect should not be discounted!) The Rogaine foam does not have the same effect though. I don't have a comparable pre-op shaved pic. Thus, given some small results, but nothing earth shattering, it was natural to go for surgery. I'm also going to go for a full 6-9 months of PRP, and continue the Rogaine and dermaroller just to give the surgery the best chance possible to work. I should also mention that I suspect Dr. Akaki, the main surgeon in Georgia, is probably more competent than the guy I saw. He also recommended laser surgery, but my own doctor did not recommend this, and someone else in the clinic told me they didn't have good results with the lasers. Also, I had a positive impression of Dr. Akaki's son, who seemed knowledgeable and took me on a tour and bought me a nice Georgian dinner the day after surgery.

OK, so the final product isn't that asymmetric, but it is noticeably so. And this is after I forced them to redraw my right side (on the left here) higher 4 times. I also didn't like that the front row of hairs wasn't staggered more than it is, but that's a minor quibble. Post-procedure, I noticed the asymmetry immediately, and asked for a few more, and they brushed me off. They had to, I guess, with the next client coming in. Anyway, fingers crossed it will look fine. But when you're paying big money, you want a little more care devoted to issues like your front hair line.

I just had one done, and let me say, I am not impressed with the clinic at all. They are not very professional. I haven't seen the results yet -- maybe I'll love them, but this was my experience. (1) (good) -- they responded promptly to my emails, and answered most of the questions I asked, although not all. I give them 9/10 here. They also cut me a 10% discount when I asked. I should have asked for 20% or 30% in retrospect. Also, I could book any day I wanted. They don't seem to be particularly busy. This should be a warning sign, however. (2) (good) the airport pickup was smooth, and I got 5 nights in a nice hotel near the clinic. (10/10 here) (3) my consult in the morning with the doctor was awful. First, there is a punctuation mistake on the sign on their door. The doctor took a look at my hair in one second and said he recommended 2,500 grafts, but that he'd throw in 100 for free. Price at $5,400. However, we'd already agreed to do 3000 grafts for $5,400. Thus, I said let's do 2500 grafts at the same rate. The doctor then said, well, actually you need 3000 grafts! Two minutes earlier he'd recommended 2500 grafts. Then he gave me a contract laden with barely-intelligible English. The doctor himself spoke almost no English, and his Russian was barely better. He spoke some English, but apparently couldn't understand any english I spoke, including the word "No". (4) Next, the doctor drew my new line on my head. He drew it very crooked -- not symmetric at all. I complained, so he had a nurse come over and tell me how symmetric it looked. It wasn't. We redrew, although the end product still wasn't perfectly symmetric. However, they were in a big rush (with another patient coming in after me), and so they put a lot of pressure on me to just do the operation and not worry about what my hairline would look like. They emphasized repeatedly how quickly they do things. So, if your primary goal is a fast operation, then this might be your place. (5) the end product still looked asymmetric in the front. (6) I have blonde hair, but it darkens at the bottom. Thus, I asked for my donor hair to be taken as high up on the back of the head as possible. The doctor told me point blank that this isn't possible. But, he also told me he could easily take another 3000 grafts. given that these aren't all coming out of the same place, I don't understand how there was 0 flexibility in choosing where 2500 grafts come from. This was also lost in translation. Georgia is a poor, developing country with low human capital. They may offer cheaper rates, but this is a reflection of lower quality and the rush with which they do their work. They made a lot of other stupid/incorrect comments during my visit. The doctor didn't seem to know what a dermaroller is. The guy who spoke english said he would be around during my procedure, but wasn't. Having written all this though, let me respond again in 6 months to see the final product. Maybe it will look great, and all this whining will have been about nothing.