Bad Hair

Appreciate the input guys. I think there's a reluctance to discuss this beacuase, as you say hairlosspa, there's no reliable measure. I think, too, that it points to the importance of choosing experienced surgeons, and especially staff/techs who process the grafts to have a highlevel of competency. Agree with Gillenator that techs are a crucuial part of the process. The techs perform critical functions, and > 50% of the operation it seems, so they better be good. The techs who've worked on me seem to have been very experienced, competent, and caring people people, but I've met other HT patients ( not on this site ) who had nightmare stories. Surviving grafts seems to depend on multiple factors, including a doctor's expertise, their techs' experience/competency, quality of donor follicles, and responsible aftercare by the patient. Since most everyone posting here had HTs under these circumctances the question of "What do you think your yield has been?" comes to mind. Based on my experience Drs Feller and Bloxham ( and their techs ) were the best HTs I've had by far. Unfortunately, I didn't discover them earlier, but better late than never. When I came to them I had significant scarring, and little donor area left. They did excellent work under difficult circumstances which is why I highly recommend anyone of similiar background/circumstances to them.

In talking to different HT doctors I've always gotten the impression that 100% of transplanted grafts that stay secure survive. I say "impression" because I've never specifically asked one if all the grafts survive. I'd always heard that these grafts are genetically coded never to fall out, but what happens when they're moved, and maybe compromised to a certain extent? Again, I'm not talking about the grafts that fall out before they can be become permanent. A friend who's an internal medicine doctor said he highly doubts 100% of these grafts survive, but she couldn't put an estimate on how many usually would survive. She said it would be too subjective, specific to the patient, and skill/experience of the doctors and their techs, etc. Of course she's not a HT doc. But it got me wondering, how many of your past HT grafts do you think have survived?

Not all doctors are in agreement on post-operative care. But they all seem to agree that alcohol before 7 days ,at a minimum, is not advised. After that, who knows? Even this article seems a bit unsure of itself, a bit ambiguous. But why would anyone who's gone through the pain and expense of a hair transplant want to risk damaging the result?!? I love to drink but I'll be waiting a month before I drink again, and even then I'll ease into it.

Looks really good! Congrats.

He put in 1294 grafts. I had a lot of scaring in my donor area, so there wasn't a lot for Dr. Bloxham to work with. He had a lot of area to cover -- center strip from front to back--- and didn't have a lot grafts to work with. He had to harvest smaller strips from a jungle of scars on the back and sides of my head. No easy feat. He clearly handles difficult HT surgeries very well. He then went from front to back planting grafts until they ran out. This was the plan we'd discussed before the surgery and I think it was the correct one. Dr. Bloxham did an excellent job and hope that my hair will now better frame my face, provide more hair in the front center part of my scalp, and give me slightly more hair in crown area. We'll see how it grows. SMP may well be in my future to add density that I've always wanted in the crown area. Please let me know if you have any thoughts on SMP for density. I'll post pix in a patient website later as Melvin-Moderator suggested.

Hi, folks. Finished my HT with Dr. Bloxham in Tuesday. Great experience working with him, his crew, Cathy, Bella and others. Very professional and kind people. This is likely my last HT as my donor area is pretty tapped out from previous HT's. These last two procedures with Feller-Bloxham ( 2013 and now ) were the best experiences I had by far. Now comes the waiting and hoping that my scalp heals up well. I may do SMP in the future but will wait and see how this new HT grows out. I highly recommend Dr. Bloxham and his staff to anyone who has experienced substandard results previously. They are the best in my book.

Hi, conan. I think doing the HT now is better. It gives you more years with better hair. By the time you get to be my age you might not even care that much what your hair looks like 😀 Also, there's no guarantee that you'll regress to a Norwood 6 level your father was. My father and I were almost clones it seemed, yet he had a full head of hair most of his life. My mother's side ( usually where the genetic trail of baldness leads ) was completely clear of baldness as best I could find. Finally, you never know what advances will be made in the next ~15 yrs. I know people will laugh at this because it always seems the latest advancement is only 5 yrs away...but it never comes. But in the 90's finasteride had no off-label anti-baldness uses, same with dutasteride. Today fin is helping you keep your hair. There may be a cure for baldness in our lifetime, but if you wait for it you'll be depriving yourself of the prime years of your life without the hair you really want. Your hair looks pretty good in these pix. Btw, if you don't do another hair transplant SMP may be another route to consider.

Hi, conan. I'm in the same situation. See Upcoming FUT with Dr. Bloxham . From my pix you can see I've lost a ton of hair since my 20's. From your pix, brighter lighting and uncombing your hair over the thin areas would provide a bettter idea of your back 2/3's hair situation. You should get evaluated by a good surgeon-- in person, as you noted-- to make sure he can examine your scalp closely. Dr.Wong is a great surgeon I've heard. I'm down to my last HT. I've chosen to do it with Dr. Bloxham this Tuesday ( the 30th). I'm very excited about this. I'm 60 yrs old, so my hairline pattern is pretty much established. Now, given my extremely limited donor area I'm down to my last HT. I considered a number of surgeons before deciding on Dr Bloxham. I'd had a transplant with Dr. Feller in 2013. The results were great, but now Dr. Feller has reduced his schedule a lot. So I chose Dr. Bloxham at the same practice ( Feller Bloxham Hair ) and am very confident he will do a great job. I met with him at the end of last year. He's a great guy, very trustworthy, and understands difficult cases like ours. I've had previous HT's with different surgeons in the past. I wish I'd discovered the Feller-Bloxham practice from the beginning because my first HT's with other surgeons were bad. Not that much scarring, but the big plugs they used in the 80-90's required remedial work. Anyway, if I were you I'd choose your "Option 1- keep the meds and do another surgery." That would preserve your hair in the back 2/3 's and give you the most options in the future. With your limited available donor area I think that's your best option. Don't stop the Finasteride. I agree with what others said, it's not going anywhere. And it's doing its job; you're not having any side effects, so all's good. I'm also considering SMP in the future for adding the appearance of greater density. Would you consider that as well for your crown area?

Thanks for writing, RP. I agree, probably best to concentrate on the frontal third. Do you think SMP could work on my mid-scalp and crown, or is there not enough hair there? I'm not really sure under which conditions SMP can work for long hair. I've seen some pix but don't know how realistic the treatment is for people like me who have serious hair loss. I'm going to look into FUE as well but I really little donor area left. I'd like this to be my last surgery. I dye my hair regularly. There's more gray hair than the pix show. I started getting gray around 35 yrs old. Yes, I really feel Dr. Bloxham will do a great job. Hope this is my last surgery. We'll see.

Hi, all. My surgery is on Tuesday ( 30th ) and I can't wait. Dr. Bloxham and his staff have been great preparing me for the procedure. Below are pix taken today. Sorry I know they're pretty bad. Hoping for better coverage, but not a lot of donor area left. If I only have 1200 grafts, where do you think they should go?

I took some pics yesterday and they came out very poorly. I'll try again soon with better lighting. I'm really looking forward to having Dr. Bloxham perform my final ( probably ) hair transplant. He's a great guy and very highly regarded. Just curious, I wonder if people had to choose one surgeon to perform their last hair transplant, who would they choose to do it?

Hi, Curious. I did have some old big plugs along my hairline removed that couldn't be redistributed because of too much scaring. Some were removed, cut up, and redistributed-- probably < 50%. Removing the big plugs resulted in a more natural, less pluggy, appearance of my hairline. Overall, I'm glad this was done... but a lot of potential hair ended up being wasted ☹️

Thanks for writing. I don't know much about going the beard hair route but will look into it. I'd probably explore FUE first. Do you know how well beard hair transplants? Just trying to imagine the process and it imagining it to be quite painful, but maybe I'm wrong. Thanks for sharing this.

Hi, folks. I'm a 60 yr old male who's had multiple hair transplants ( HT ), with 4 different doctors. My first HT was in 1984 when the technology was in the Stone Age compared to today. As a result, some of my surgeries have been as much about remediation of large, poorly- placed plugs, transected grafts, etc, as it's been about trying to add new hair. My last HT was in 2013 with Dr. Feller. It was my first HT with him, and by far the best. He's outstanding. But now Feller has cut back on the number of surgeries he's doing. This is likely my LAST hair transplant since I have very little donor left, so i really wanted to make the right choice for a surgeon. After considering going many different surgeons my gut told me to return to Feller Bloxham. I'm going to do my HT on April 30th with Dr. Blake Bloxham, Feller's partner at Feller Bloxham Hair. I met with Dr. Bloxham last fall was greatly impressed with his professionalism, knowledge, and empathy for my situation. He estimates that he can do another FUT of ~ 1200 grafts from my remaining donor area. I'm confident Dr. Bloxham and his staff will do an outstanding job, and am really looking to the procedure. I realize ~1200 grafts is nothing these days, but that's about all I have left for a strip. All the previous HT's have left me with very little donor area. I'll post some pictures when I get a chance. This is likely my LAST HT since I have very little donor left. Now, I have only the left side of my head ( above my ear and running towards the back of my head ) available for a donor strip. I have thinning in the middle of my scalp that runs from front to back. Dr. Bloxham's goal is to provide density to the middle front, as well as provide more density to the thinning middle that goes to back to my crown. My crown area has the thinnest coverage. I've been told many times that the front area is much easier to get better results. Dr. Bloxham plans to go from front to back until the grafts run out. My plan after this last HT is to try SMP to address the remaining lack of coverage/density that might exist. So my game plan consists of a combination of a final HT and then SMP? Have other people been in this same situation? Thanks for letting me know.