RepairingNW3

It’s the name of one of his procedures.

I had a ‘Celebrity FUE’ five years ago. In retrospect I would have at least done a traditional FUE, or worked with someone else. What’s done is done and I still prefer what I had now than what I had before. But I’d encourage you to explore your options as you seem to be.

I’ve been meaning to post for a while. It’s been over 13 months since my procedure. Overall, I am satisfied with my final result. My hairline is lowered, and I’m able to style my hair the way I like without trying to hide any of my forehead. Its not perfect. There is thinness at the line where they tried to design my new hairline in the temple corners, so I have to style it carefully to disguise it. However, the frontal hairline is absolutely perfect. Compared to what I had before, this is a win! It’s possible in the future I will attempt to fill in the temple recession or, with enough grafts, lower my hairline more. I will wait for some time though to conserve my grafts for the crown whenever I need that. Depending on what my situation is at that time I may do more hairline work. This is good enough for me :)

I had a procedure with Dr. Mohebi exactly one year ago. You can search for my experience on this forum. My results with Mohebi were good, and I’m satisfied overall. It’s not perfect, but it was worth it to me. I’m no longer self-conscious about my hair. That’s pretty huge. I still think his bedside manner could be improved. I wouldn’t expect him (or any hair transplant doctor, for that matter) to be 100% honest and forthcoming, and he likes to interrupt and talk over people. But his team saved my hair, and he did in fact work out my grievances with me. That’s worth something too.

Overall, I am very satisfied with my experience with Dr. Mohebi. I recommended him to a friend of mine recently, and I would personally consider going back to him in the future for a second operation when I need one.

Sure. The detail is not as fine from farther out, but you can still get a sense for where the old hairline and new hairline meet. And you can see the empty-ish patch on the right temple corner from this view as well. The rest is blending in really nice. I'm able to style it now and blend it together. It will only look better from here on out.

5 months today exactly since the operation. Here are the results so far... There is a patch on the right temple corner that appears like it didn't hold the grafts. If you look closely, you can see the empty patch is where my pre-treatment hairline is. I'm hoping it will still come in and that it's just late growth, but I've had rapid growth so far and I know that the coverage area is apparent by 6 months even if fullness isn't. I have a feeling that this small section may not be as consistent as the rest of the results. But overall I am very happy with how it's progressing. I'll post again at 8 months.

1.25 mg finasteride daily for exactly 6 years now. It's also worth noting that I started taking oral minoxidil 5mg daily at the exact same time. 1) Yes. My erections are 10% less hard than they used to be. It's had no impact on my sex life/performance so far other than I can't get "rock hard" anymore. I'm also aging, so that could be contributing too. It's not a big deal at all. Side effects probably started within the first year. 2) No. If anything, I think it has gotten a little worse over time. Again, I'm not sure if this is age-related/ 3) I briefly discontinued finasteride for 1-2 months a few years ago. Because the side effects were so minimal I couldn't really tell if they changed during that time 4) I take 1.25 mg daily. I'd like to take 1mg but I haven't figured out a way to cut my 5mg pills into fifths. Too much work. I have a pill cutter and just cut them into four. 5) I took pictures before and after, and there was a major difference at 3 months. My hair became thicker and I grew new hair, which I believe the oral minoxidil helped with.

Here are photos taken just now, exactly 3 and a half months since the day of operation. Many of the hairs transplanted appear to have come through. They are still fine and some are kinky as expected in early growth, but the coverage is really nice and blends good with my existing hair. Most of the redness and any signs of an operation are virtually gone. I just had a pimple for the first time in about 3 weeks on my right temple, so that has pretty much stopped although it was quite minimal before. Itching isn't as frequent. If this is just a preview of what's to come, I am very curious how the final result will look. I am really happy with how it looks already. Over the next month or two, I am expecting that I will be able to style it better with my existing hair. I already feel more confident and think far less about my hairline than I have in probably 15 years! It's like a miracle.

Here is an update from Day 70. I am starting to see some early growth. Some of what you see growing is hair that was shaved off around the original hairline in the recipient area (particularly in the front). But I can also see and feel now some new growth all over the recipient area. As is typical, the hairs are quite fine at this point and are just initially coming in. Although there is still a ways to go to the final result, I am hopeful right now that it will be a nice result to show. The remaining redness looks more prominent in these photos than it does in person. It's hard to notice it at all when my hair is down. The donor area seems to have healed well from what I can feel and see, although I might buzz that area at some point to get a closer look at it. I've only had minor occasional pimples in both the recipient and donor area so far, although one burst on its own after a shower recently. I'm not sure if that could cause any damage to the follicle beneath it, but I doubt it. I'll post again in another 4-6 weeks when I get closer to the 4-month appearance. That should be a more interesting update.

I use the gentle dabber that comes with Dermamatch to conceal the redness, as well as any particularly thin spots on the crown. Dermamatch acts similar to brow powder - you can apply it directly to skin. Since the color matches my hair, I can give a slight impression of a lower hairline/fuller hair than what I have. Because of my recession + the shaving that we did during the procedure, the baldness in that area would be more transparent without the concealer. I will likely use it until the redness disappears and the hairs regrow more fully.

Here are Day 27 photos. You can see that I've shed most of the recipient hairs by now. I know a lot of people seem to get bummed when this happens, but I've actually been eager for it since it indicates progression toward new growth eventually. I've also still got a fair bit of redness on the recipient area, which I cover with Dermamatch when I go out. I think I might end up being one of those cases that stays red for 2-3 months. We'll see. I have no idea what the donor area looks like since we didn't shave back there. I've noticed an occasional pimple in the donor or recipient area the last couple of days, but it seems to go away pretty quick. Most importantly, I was recently able to work out a fair agreement with Dr. Mohebi that satisfies my grievances regarding the aspects of the procedure that I've detailed in my initial post. He was quite willing to consider my vantage point, even if we still disagreed on a couple of things. He was able to appreciate my concerns in such a way that led him and his team to consider some changes to how they explain aspects of the procedure to their patients. I really admired his patient-centered approach to our recent discussion and his ability to acknowledge the legitimacy in my concerns. I feel good about our working relationship again. I have a feeling that if we do more work together in the future, we'll both be on the same page next time. I even referred a friend to him today. This whole process has been such a learning and life-changing experience for me. I have taken up a much deeper education in hair transplantation than I had ever anticipated, and I'm still learning. I very much look forward to seeing how the results come in, and I'll continue to post with updates as things progress.

No, you are correct. The donor area was not shaven; only the recipient area where the hairs were implanted. Of the grafts that were implanted, I was told during the final stages of the surgery that probably 20%ish of the grafts implanted were my longer hairs (you can see from the post-op pics) - a very different figure from the 80% I was quoted in the email. Their not shaving my donor area at all is arguably the only aspect of the surgery that distinguished it from a traditional FUE procedure of this graft size. When you say "big effort for no benefit", those are my thoughts exactly. We could have used all that extra time for more grafts, an easier procedure, and a cheaper price!

I do not consent to disclosing my identity to you and am not required to do so in order to keep the post on the forum. I have followed the forum guidelines and provided a fair, balanced, and honest review of the pros/cons of my surgery. I am not particularly interested in an internet argument with my doctor for the public to witness. If you remove the post, I'll have to speculate as to why, and I can just post it elsewhere on the internet. I believe that there is room for honest, balanced reviews, not just ones that are glowing.

Recovery. So far, the recovery has been pretty smooth without complications. I stopped seeing crusts around the one week mark when I began washing my hair normally again in the shower and was able to scrub the scabs off using the special sponge I was provided with for post-op washing. I still had some flaking/dandruff until around Day 10, but that has since stopped. There was a period where I felt some intermittent soreness at the donor area when I would feel around it; it felt as if I was being poked with needles again (pimples? If so, they are no longer there). I still have redness in my recipient area, like a sunburn, but it's been getting better little by little. No pimples in the recipient area so far, but I heard that it's possible over the next few weeks/months I may see some of those. Grievances. I had my first follow-up Facetime consultation yesterday with Dr. Mohebi. There was no mention of my grievances. Someone on here said that it could be worth exploring some type of refund for the difference between the procedure I received and the procedure I paid for. I would have ideally liked to see some sort of discount worked out. But given how he responded with defensiveness when I brought up my concerns during our meeting the day after my procedure, I am certain that any attempts on my part to work something out would have been disappointing. I'm sure the last thing a doctor like this wants is to lose money. Really, the only thing about this procedure that was promised and fully delivered was that they didn't shave my donor area. Because it was a small procedure though, they could have just shaved a small strip and disguised it with my existing hair. Had I done that, I would have paid close to literally half of the price for it. Someone going in with a hairline like mine could save a lot of money and time by doing a partial shave FUE. I could have saved $9,000 had I pursued that route. My girlfriend has convinced me to stop complaining so much about it for the sake of my health. Photos. Here are my photos from 14 days post-op. If I've started losing grafts, I haven't really noticed. At least one person so far in my workplace was secretly checking out my hairline when I was looking away, but most people haven't said anything if they do notice that I had something done. My frontal hair definitely appears thinner and my hairline higher. I'm trying not to be sore about it and prefer to move on with my life. I'll continue to post occasionally with updates and, of course, show the results. I definitely like the new hairline that was drawn and am very interested in seeing how the final result appears a year from now. I think if it all comes in well it's going to look great. Future Work. I'd like to see how my hair loss stabilizes over the next 2-5 years as I move into my late thirties and then consider another operation where I thicken the top and potentially fill in the temples more. You can see in this picture when I pull my hair back how there is thinness on the frontal crown, for example. But I am a little worried about how much I can trust what these doctors tell me now if I do future work. I'd ideally like to work with someone who does the operation themselves and also delivers the procedure as it is agreed upon during the initial consultations.

I had a "Celebrity FUE" procedure at Dr. Parsa Mohebi's office yesterday in Encino, CA. This is my initial post and will detail my journey with this procedure. I will continue to post occasionally until the final result is achieved. About Celebrity FUE / Unshaven FUE Procedures For those who don't know, "Celebrity FUE" is the term Dr. Mohebi has used to describe what is also known as a "non-shaved FUE procedure." On his website, he details both that this is a non-shaved procedure, that "the Celebrity FUE technique allows patients to keep their hair long during their procedure." I have attached screenshots of these statements to this post. At this time of writing, there is also a video on his Celebrity FUE page which says, "we don't cut, trim, or shave any hair." Why I Chose Dr. Parsa Mohebi As a public health professional, my top priority is to conceal my hair transplant from my patients while also getting good results. I had initially booked an FUE procedure with Dr. John Diep, but Dr. Diep told me he would need to shave the baby hairs on my hairline to implant the grafts. Although I admired his results more than anyone else I had seen within the US, ultimately, his statement led to me canceling the procedure with him. After reviewing many, many other surgeons, I scheduled a consultation with Dr. Mohebi., who I had bookmarked from my prior search - specifically because he offers a "Celebrity FUE" procedure. It was the most expensive of options I could have chosen, but concealing the transplant was critical to me, even if the results might not be as ideal to me - as long as it was good enough. Another selling point to me was that he said, as he does on his website, that "80% of transplanted grafts will already have your longer hair." During the consultation, I was assured like the videos that there would be no cutting of my current hair so that I could completely conceal the transplant. Additionally, when I asked Dr. Mohebi if he performs the surgery himself, he said straightforwardly said "yes." He reinforced that the grafts would be of my longer hair and said I would see a good preview of what my hair would look like after the full results were achieved. Not only was this attractive to me because I could conceal the transplant, but also potentially pull off a more enhanced hair look for the first month after the surgery. Surgery Day / The Experience The meeting I had with him in-person the day before the procedure went well. We examined my loss pattern with a microscope and determined the density of various areas, particularly the donor area. I showed him pictures of my hair loss progression over two decades (starting at 16 years old, I'm now about to turn 36). We created a long-term plan for my hair restoration that included potentially rebuilding the temples at some point (though not necessary) and thickening the crown and vertex at a later date when it is needed. When I arrived the next morning to begin the surgery, he asked me if we could trim my baby hairs around my hairline. Whenever anyone says trim, it means literally to trim - not shave or buzz off. Even though I did not give consent to this on the written forms, I said yes verbally because I knew he was indicating that doing so would provide optimal results for incision and inserting the grafts. He then told me there would be a few ladies assisting him during the procedure. I imagined these assistants would help with graft harvesting and counting. Once I was in the chair, I was sedated with laughing gas and one Valium. Once sedated, he requested "the clippers" from one of the technicians and buzzed off about a half-inch all around the hairline on my crown - my hairline now resembling an old Nicholas Cage. I was not happy, but it was too late, I was sedated, and there was no point in pulling out at this point. Once I was fully sedated, Dr. Mohebi used his syringe to provide me with good local anesthesia as needed. The pain was more minimal than a regular injection you would receive from a lab technician doing bloodwork. Dr. Mohebi then began extracting a number of grafts from my donor area using a tool that made drilling-like noises - the puncher, I assume. I do not believe this tool was used on extracting all of my grafts, and Dr. Mohebi himself did not extract all of my grafts. After a short period of time, probably around a half hour, and while my head was now positioned down facing the floor, I stopped hearing his voice but felt the work continuing. When I asked what was happening and where Dr. Mohebi went, the four female technicians said "he has left to do other things while we catch up for him with the graft removal and placement process." This process continued, largely without Dr. Mohebi for the remaining 9 hours of the 10 hour surgery. The female technicians continued to chat with each other thoroughout the surgery. Dr. Mohebi would check in about once every two hours for about five or ten minutes to see how things were going, usually to administer more local anesthesia (I assume the technicians are not able to do this). Once he came in and rotated a couple of grafts that one of his technicians had inserted for him, I heard him say "these here need to be turned around." I was not happy with this process since I was told he would be conducting the surgery and there was no mention of technicians who would essentially be doing the whole procedure for him - technicians whose credentials I have no knowledge of and that I was not able to evaluate prior to my surgery. It is my understanding that all graft removal and placements are critical to the outcome results of the surgery. I would say Dr. Mohebi was in the room for a total of less than one hour for the ten hour procedure, and often for only 5-10 minutes at a time, usually to administer more local anesthesia. I did not vocalize my unhappiness during the procedure. The last thing I wanted to do was cause a stink while a group of people are operating on my head whose mood/focus I might affect. But I was not happy. A significant amount of the hair that I use for coverage of my temples had been buzzed off, and the process of the surgery was not what I was told it would be. I could have seen Dr. Diep for the same offered procedure (a buzzing of my baby hairs with FUE grafts) for thousands of dollars less and more density/grafts! The extra precautions I had requested be taken with Dr. Mohebi to conceal my operation and keep my hair have not only been been compromised, but disregarded when the doctor knew this was my top priority. Additionally, though he told me in an email prior that 80% of the grafts would contain my longer hair so I could see a preview of the results, he said at the end of the surgery that only half of the implanted grafts had hair. The hairs that were there were not my full length either, so it seemed pointless to me that we did this method of a procedure at all. The procedure itself was not painful. The four female technicians were very polite, though it did bother me that I had no idea they would be performing the surgery and what their experience/credentials were, if they were rented assistants, etc.... There were a couple of bad (i.e. mildly painful) punches that happened on occasion, but it was so minor that it barely registered. The most uncomfortable part was the pressure on my forehead from laying forward for a long time, and my hands/arms would go numb from laying them underneath my chest. I took three breaks in total throughout the 10 hour surgery - one of them for lunch, and the other two to use the bathroom. In total, I received 1567 grafts. Of those grafts, roughly 338 were triples, another 950 were doubles, and 279 were singles. I was given Valium, some extra strength Tylenol, and Prednisone to help me through the first days of recovery. Next Day Follow-up Meeting In my follow-up meeting the next day, one of the technicians from the surgery showed me how to wash my hair for the next four days. I felt the post-operation procedures were explained to me thoroughly. Finally, I met once more with Dr. Mohebi for about 10 minutes. I told him that I had a comfortable surgery experience with minimal pain, and that I was looking forward to seeing how the results turned out, but that I was very disappointed with how much of my hair was buzzed (not trimmed), which would compromise the concealing of my hair transplant, and also that I didn't appreciate how he told me he would do the surgery but in the end his technicians did. Although I could tell he was trying to remain professional in his response, he was quite defensive. At one point, he told me "I was there for most of the procedure, you just didn't see me because your head was down." I told him I knew this wasn't true because I heard every time he entered and left the room, and that I confirmed his absence with the technicians. He looked surprised. He then told me at least he did all of my graft extractions and incisions. I told him this was also not 100% true, because the technicians told me they were continuing to do extractions for him while he was gone. He then told me it was in my best interest to not have him insert my grafts anyway, because "I am not good at graft insertion. When I try to do it, my technicians laugh at me." I believe he continued to minimize his role in selling me on a procedure that did not meet our shared understanding and agreement. Finally, he was able to say: "I'm sorry. Thank you for your feedback. I will certainly consider it in how I advertise this procedure going forward." I was calm and rational with him throughout this conversation, but I was pretty upset with the accruing dishonesty made by this man, further reinforced by his responses to me during the conversation. I made my point clear though: I was lied to about the details of the procedure. My remaining hair looks drastically different and will not provide the coverage or natural lift as an unshaven head would have provided to conceal the operation, which is what we were going for. Far fewer implanted hairs are in place, and the ones that are look out of place. He told me he would be performing the surgery. He did not mention it would be completed by technicians nor that he his involvement would be minimal, let alone that he is "not good at graft insertion." I paid $21,000 for this procedure. I could have achieved 2000-2500 grafts with Diep for the same process of a procedure (and he was honest with me about it). I believe I was sold with a bait and switch approach here, and that hurts, given how much trust, vulnerability, and investment goes into this process. Had me told me from the first consultation when I asked him my questions and said, "we may need to shave part of your hair for optimal results, and my technicians do most of the work," then I could have made a more educated choice. I'm more than sure he was aware of this. These doctors are salesmen and marketers too, not just surgeons. Having said all of this, I do look forward to seeing how the results come out. I really do. I like the hairline that Dr. Mohebi drew for me. In 12 months I am hopeful that I will feel happier with my appearance than I do today. If the results are good, which I am hopeful they may be, it will be a significant improvement to my self-esteem and long-term concerns about my hair. But it doesn't change the facts of what happened, the bait-and-switch tactics, and the enormous additional cost to have a procedure done that did not do what it said it would do or performed by who said he would perform it. The procedure itself was not painful. What is painful is that the top reason I chose this particular procedure and to pay the incredibly high cost for its specialty approach was pointless. Not to mention the emotional pain of putting my trust, vulnerability, and a high premium financial investment into a procedure that could have been replicated cheaper and with an outcome that I believe would have been more desirable. And so regardless of my final results here, which I hope are good, it won't erase the reality of what has transpired here. I believe that I had the right to have the realistic process explained to me given my questions, concerns, and priorities for having the procedure with Dr. Parsa Mohebi. I will continue to post and update on my progress over the months ahead. I have attached pictures for exhibit of what is currently advertised as a Celebrity FUE procedure on his website, along with an email exchange, and pre-op pics of my hair and now post-op pics of my hair. While it is too late to go back in time, and although l am upset and have lost more money (and potentially though hopefully not compromised my results), my hope is that for those of you reading this you will realize how important it is to ask every little detail about the procedure. Even when I asked "will you be performing the procedure?" and received an immediate and straightforward "yes," it was later minimized and defended post-op by him saying "but I was there." We need more transparency and honesty in marketing. When it's not there, one cannot help but wonder why.