scar5

Yep, if my research is correct, they are monochrome like HIS. Black and White TV all the way. Those people with fairer hair will be offered a more diluted black, that is all. And they will be told they have to cut their hair really all off in future to get the best benefit. They will also be reminded that shaved hair of any color looks black beneath the skin, and hence.... They don't need to shave it in all reality, but they will be told they have to, despite the ads that suggest growth is possible. Color mismatch and color is an intriguing shadow of knowledge for the SMP researcher. Ate you now a rep for NHI? or doing e show as part of the 'give and take' thing u mentioned?

Stem cell, not steam cell. If you are having a laugh, that's fine.. well done. If you are serious, then I must say, you must be joking. Waiting for stem cell, homeopathy, or any of the 'natural' therapies are just not real. You are on the way to going bald. good luck

HairPhnatic, Can I call you HairPhantastic, or Hair Phantasia? No, oh, well, Do you know there are products to deal with scalp shine? Just rub them on like sun screen and get a matte finish. Reading between the lines, it seems to me, you feel that in a world of relative morality, we need a bit of give-and-take. And this apples in the Clinic, Poster and Forum relationship. And so being decent to everyone as well as cutting a bit of slack seems to be in order. Sounds like a smart philosophy. Some questions more, if you wouldn't mind. How did you take to the idea that NHi are all black, or shades of grey and use no colors whatsoever? Were you aware of that? And I take it you were aware that in Jotronics excellent write up on Milena (or was it Spex?) where the color and size philosophy was spelled out. And that was, small pigments, no black. I know you are of Asian descent, so I am guess you are all for black, but did you know that, that was your only choice? Did they say specifically to you, "We are all black?" I agree about the pain. It always makes me cringe to read these reps talk about SMP as being painless. It is not just the reps, it is the honest punter, who has decided to post about his 'positive' experience and can't be compromising the 'joy' message. SMP hurts!! No, it doesn't kill you. It isn't like root canal surgery, but it is nagging, persistent and really, really nasty for a long time!! It's about time people know it about this small but nagging issue. And I guess that with the Milena technique it might hurt less, due to the extremely shallow depth. My problem with temp is that you are basically just putting ink into dead keratin which sheds at speeds according to the treatment it gets. No swimming, no sun etc.. Unless you are ready to wind down the clock. Thanks for the best write up so far about an SMP. Too bad about the docs prognosis, I tjhougt that with propecia u might have more to work with. Good luck

And how would they be progressing on that score?

meh...I went from open-faced NW3 in mid '88 to poster boy November '89 thanksgiving to three strips of only 80 then 150 and then 80 'grafts' . Doc would not refer to them as plugs because of the connotations with the (then, very recent) past. The size of the transplants has obviously changed, but mine was what you call life changing and very dramatic. Where I think the change happened was the switch to follicular units, which ironically gave you MUCH LESS density. They planted veritable bushes on my head, like stalks. Shocking, but brilliant for aestheics provided hair was behind. so I guess that is where progress has taken place. But by '94, my doc had gone to mini-micro grafts and better (not nearly good enough) incision angles. Yeah, so I sorta see what you mean.

Ha..ha?? I should mention that Propecia has been linked to depression and that my friend, is something we don't need more of, so I dunno, but have a look at the wiki article.

That's an interesting comment. From my perspective, there have been almost no progress since the 1990s. The five years preceding the 90s, had a bigger development curve than all the years, and that's 23, since. In 2013 we still have, Strip harvesting is performed almost exactly the same way as it was, incredibly, still often with multi-bladed instruments. There are now as there was then, single bladed strips. Mine in 1988 was. The mega-session is just a catch word for the natural incremental increases that would accompany the mass commercialism of HT. Just like say, aircraft in the late 30s flew millions more people further than the early 30s with essentially the same technology. FUE started commercially in earnest in 1989. It is performed pretty much the same way today. Granted, the development of punches has been the one change that comes to mind, but essentially, it is the same old same old FUE, despite the acronyms and gimmicks. Hair multiplication has been the on going phantom-in-the-wind, the same old jack-o-lantern, I've known since I was a wee boy. Always, perpetually around the corner. The stuff of breakfast televison. Medications like. Propecia were approved in 1997, but taken earlier by many. 1992 was when fin got approved for prostate and it wasn't long after that hair heads got word of it. The only progress I see is in consumer awareness and their demand for FUE. The difference between say 1982 and 1987 was phenomenal. In just five years we went from scalp flaps, reductions and giant plug grafts, to strip transplantation.

No good. You need to wait at least 12 months, and take plenty of pics so that your emotions don't trick you. The pimples, greasiness, and warmness of the skin were so common to me in my late teens early 20s in my balding temples and it was all that sebum, building up where the hair was minaturizing. It went hand-in-hand with balding for me. Horrible reminder every day, that it was all going. You have to get on that propecia again and stick it out or resign yourself to baldness and start planning a new look.

Haha- di- ha ..ha... You are good looking, have the hair the chicks kill for.. And the guys will be very happy you are gonna lose it!!! Me personally, I say I knew many guys who really got a break on me, when I lost the only attribute I had, very young. It hurt me later, to see a guy your age, who had hair like that. chicks loved him. Started to lose it, gradually, he kept his head high, shaved it off and kept his head high..That is a true story, even though i believe in the power of the almighty gambit of the bluff, because keeping your head high is of course just bluff, but it works, not only on the world, but on yourself. ((at times) Now, none of this is helping. Do u want to enter the secret and lonely world of hair loss "sufferers"? If you do, there is plenty you can do. First, propecia is a great start. I would recommend a blood test for a DHT profile, but almost nobody bothers, so, meh... See how propecia goes for a year, and then reassess. Take a set of pics like you have done. Be brutal, try different lighting. When looking out for side-effects, consider carefully and try not to over react. You are still flying high at this point with great hair, so you have the reserves of confidence not to do that. Meds don't do much for temples. An HT will give you a great solid front line you can comb back and keep that surfer-rock star thing going much, much longer. But it will kill a decent amount of that miniaturizing hair battling on the front lines, as well as behind. You might transplant 2500 grafts, say at 27-28 and look brilliant, but you will lose at least that in shock loss. But these hairs would be doomed anyway!! ...that is, without propecia. Do once again, I reiterate, propecia for a trial. And speaking as an old man. You look great, you would have confidence. You can make the transition to short or bald with confidence starting high, falling a few thousand feet rapidly, but then keep flying. If you enter the world of HT, you can expect a rocky descent if you start messing about too much, or your cards don't fall the right way. Anyway, still looking good. More power to you.

Seeming u r already stripped-scarred, I can see where u are coming from. I had my last strip many years after I began bitching about strip, based on the same rationale, (or fair to say, being seduced by myself and the doc to do it - regretted it, but did get a few extra fat grafts) You have a unique situation, something I know nothing about, as I guess, most of us don't, but you seemed to have looked into it, Just make sure they don't stretch the length of the scar too much. They almost always want to do that, and its bad, even though more grafts result ( and coincidently more of your hard earned cash goes into their kids' college funds!!) Well, anyway, best of luck. Preparing for short hair after the cover up can be a bit nerve wracking for me, as can the post buzz re-assessment. I guess you ware a great candidate for SMP, but I think a trial in the scar tissue might b worth it.

First of all, strip can produce fantastic results, but I must warn you., you are really deluding yourself if u think u can jusy patxh up a strip scar with smp and fue, before u gi in. Ur,scar migjt be flat, but even so.,if scar is on ur mind, dont fall fir the false hope that strp+smp+fue=fue. On to your main question. Dont put ink into healing tissue unless u r ready for the pogments to spread morr rapidly or unpredictably., I've asked precicely thae same question,trcently and was told 6-12 months,,because only then is the injured tissue stable and healed.Good luck.

Yep.. Exactly. Bisanga is great but has three things to consider, 1) Likes FUE for 'small' jobs..even though his showman is/was? A 7000 FUE. Otherwise it is strip, replete with the handsome growth that strip affords. 2) Has a conservative FUE extraction protocol. 3) Does extractions himself, which taxes his wrists and hands BUT he has the talent, to do dense and very shallow-angle incisions. Lorenzo iseems to be the current rock-star. He has blown open the tin pot arguments about FUE being a small local boutique type of touch up procedure to augment strip. Without any BHT he began to show the world what FUE can do, in big numbers. I just hope he trains techs to do extractions, and moves off-shore to a place where they can legally do it, because he will ruin his hands and wrists soon enough at this rate. Meantime, enjoy the rewards. I always have said strip gives more robust growth, but Lorenzo and Bisanga are so good, perhaps it's time to re-examine that too.

Brilliant Billena, Just fantastic. This is the ISHRS!! The thing that was derided.. It's fantastic to see their program! Especially the wine tour! Seriously speaking for a moment.. Several FUE workshops! (When in years gone by it would have been laughed at) Sevaral FUE vs Strip sessions ! ( When for years, members of the HT community yawn and tried to shut down the discussion, whining about it. Even forum moderators - not this one - tried to shut it down, or trivialize it by saying, "It depends what you are comfortable with" ) Well, guess what guys!! It is relevant!! ARTas sessions...Great!!, fantastic, and a great advert for the HT industry, finally starting, in America, to turn the great ship around. And of course, the Californian wine tours would surely be helpful too.

O can definitely grow hair with SMP, but SMP operators will not recommend it. It reminds me of HT clinics. It is simply not worth it for clinics to start telling people to ink and then grow, because people are unreasonable and unrealistic all over the place. There will be plenty of miss-hits and scope for embarrassment on tne web as unsatisfied clients start blowing up clinics who told them they could grow it" Haiirthere, At the expense I thread hijack, I can say, I am not trying to be coy, but I am not going buy in to a relationship with a company or clinic on this forum, so I won't say where I have been recently. I still have more work to do and there has always been plenty to complain about as well as applaud about the operators I have dealt with. So why just say the good stuff? Anyway, Has the color changed? Well, yes it has faded somewhat, and good thing I say. But no, in that the actual tone hasn't changed. I wou ld describe it as a silverish grey under light, that takes on a grey, blue tone when the bright sharp lighting is not present, or when under the light of the slightly blueish fluorescent lights popular in offices. In flash camera conditions, it looks positively ridiculous in my (paranoid?) mind. Luckily, those flash conditions are rare. Then there are like blotches, where a distinctly bluer or darker stain runs through it. The dots are so small, it more or less looks like one blur. This blur does not fan out into more distinct and sparsely spaced dots, as it should. It reaches to the limits of the hairline and stops, just like I dreaded it would, just like I insisted it shouldn't, and just like I was assured it wouldn't. (Message to all SMP clients!! When operator tilts head comfortingly saying, 'I know, I know, Iknow what you dont want" translate that into your head as, "I know what you are saying, they all say the same, and I have an appointment at six, and if you think I'm gonna fiddle around here like I am Leonardo DiVinci , forget it") The color also changes due to the length of my hair. As the hair grows and bleaches itself in the sun( remember HT hair bleaches easily from sunlight, because it's low density allows more light between hairs) As the hair grows it appears lighter then finally darker, so that when I have enough hair to comb over my thin crown, the SMP provides a blackish background that blends pretty well with th e darker roots coming out. Biggest concern is hairline. I had touch ups on the side, and when I did I made significant progress by asking the SMP operator to change inks for the perimeter portion, as well as insisting on jagged edges, thIs worked a treat. Tis was counter to his experience, and said that many clients insist on jagged, only to return and ask for it to be flattened out. Well I can catergorically say, my own design was brilliant, at least in the sense, that it looks natural. SMp has allowed me to reform my hairline with HT, when normally I would have to put any donor hair I could eek out in the crown and vertex. Instead, the lower density both in donor and recipient has allowed me to be far more aggressive. Remember SMP helps you get more FUE extractions too, because you can use ink to balance up the weaker areas in the donor. I can say that in my case, unequivocally, SMP works with grown out hair and I have a semi-decent slightly unnatural NW2 hairline and some very dodgy areas of growth behind. I must also say, that despite SMP helping, I have lost two things. nice clear natural skin tones, that looked good on the sides and humps, and are now just a nebulous wall of grey. It makes me look older. Yet, when I see those empty and red zones of the past, I feel better I did it.

Yes, you can grow hair and the ink will act as background that contributes to the illusion that you have a much more consistent coverage. Color doesn't have to be perfectly matched and such a match is impossible for a lighter color hair anyway, as the hair changes in tone as it grows and naturally bleaches from sunlight. There are some lengths where it works better and worse and shine can be an issue but products can reduce the scalp shine that would otherwise expose the areas lacking hair. The depth of the dermis and epidermis varies acrosss individuals and on each persons scalp in different places. A famous doc ( now banned) used to perform a dermal depth analysis on his patients. It would be too costly for an SMP operator, but a skilled one can see the ink spreading as well as assess the tactile feedback of the instrument as they apply ink, and then adjust for it. I can't remember he depth of my dermis from the surface? but remember that Hairthere .5mm is based on the Milena formula, not that it bad, but it is temporary. I think my SMP was about 1mm deep

Keep in mind that SMP does not mimic the transition from no hair- to thin miniaturizing hair very well. The hairlines tend to be blunt because the SMPoperators don't have the time and skill to create a transition. But if u have hair there, u can grow it.

If you have an exposed fake SMP hairline you need it shorter than 2, even shorter than 1. If you have hair along the edge of the ink, then you can grow your hair as long as you want.

So this post is about our HUv guy in Sweden, and I think he would be fine with FUE and SMP combo, but I wonder about his med situation. In my case, I have had SMP since 2003 and will have more in 2014. And yes, they are terrible and dodgy, but if dealing with the devil is what ya gotta do, then ya gotta do it.

Jotronic, (HUVUD, just asking on UR behalf, and my dog, who is very curious about your case) Do you think this guy would have any hope on Fin, to drag him back to a NW6? Cause I'm thinking, he might, just might benefit from an FUE/SMP combo, although he would also be fine bald.

HairPhantic, That is a great write up. Thank you for posting it. I haven't done a write up, but one day, perhaps I will. And people like you give me reason to think about it. But I am being a bald-faced, two-headed, two-faced, bald-headed liar here, as chances are I won't.. Well, before looking at your SMP report, I gotta say something about your general hairloss situation that strikes me is that I think you need to look at TURKEY, Lorenzo in the UK, and also perhaps, someone like a Dr. Villnow in Germany. Yet to see many of the last doc I mentioned's, results, same with Dr. Umar in California, despite the last's enormous web profile, almost all BHT enhanced HTs. Don't stick to North America IMO.. Expensive, limited. American and Canadian docs, as well as European docs that worked stateside almost all give u a very grave prognosis about your transplant prospects because their FUE lens is skewed in the direction of extremely conservative figures. In some cases, such as with H and Wong, they might tell you u r not suitable for an HT outright, simply because you don't fit in with THEIR model, which of course is strip, or if they do move u on to an FUE clinic, unlikely as they would probably prefer you to consider their own SMP service, you will get grim numbers for graft quotes. This is also very tied to your response to meds, although with FUE, retreat is an option. How is propecia going? So anyway, I think FUE will help you n future, but make sure the angles are super flat and that way, the shingle effect will kick in better, at the expense of high or big but probably patchy new hair. On to the SMP I agree, your skin tones and natural hair color suit SMP so much more than the Celtic white-pink stuff people like me deal with. The dots look OK in the pic, whilst there is a change in darkness and texture where real hair grows, it doesn't look like a drastic contrast. You will need more, which brings me to the point. How do you suppose the smudging thing you mentioned will be avoided, given the rate at which economy dictates the speed of each penetration of the inking tool. I mean, they go in fast, right? Totally impossible not to be hammering over previous dots? Would you agree? Secondly, I am quite interested in your comments about five years. Where did you get that number, and do you still believe it? Thirdly, how is the fading going? I keep changing my mind about fading. Is it fading, is it not? Finally, are you conscious of shine or shininess? Are you attempting to make your scalp less shiney?

Good luck. I hope you know that Sydney to Istanbul return flights are under 1500 and u can fly back without a strip scar. (That would be the ear-to-ear variety for the rest of your life)

*Once u move that tissue forward, u r stilldealing with DHT resistant follicles in so far as they were,originally at the back. That is the grrst miracle upon which HTs ...eh...bloomed. Of courede, hair can shrink, even from the back, cause some people get that, but the move from the south coast to the north doesnt change the accent

The picture is over exposed so I can't see the scar properly, but in any case, it's wide. So welcome to our club. You are now one of millions with an uncomfortable strip scar, courtesy of your friendly HT surgeon. (At least you paid for it!) lol What you can do. ..if you think you will lose more hair and meds is not stabilizing your situation 1) Have the scar excised and re-joined 2) Don't get too greedy for more hair while at it 3) Be extremely diligent whilst it heals 4) Hope, prey the doc and your skin work well together on that day 5) Wait 12 months 6) Re-Assess 7) FUE into the remaining scar 8) Wait 9-12 months 9) SMP into the scar if it still bothersome and by then you want a short hair cut due to advancing loss 10) Come onto these forums and warn people about strip scars lol ..just kidding...Move on with life!! and try not to dwell on it. If you can keep enough overall hair, you might just need a but of FUE in it, but it does look pretty wide. Feel for you. Good luck. ..if meds are working fine Think of all the guys walking around in Brasil with scars like that. I wonder what the doc told you when you asked him/her? (You did ask?)

Alright, I step forth with the a new dignity, chastened and scolded in the wrath of Dylan Thomas (by the way Caddy, by the way those boys of summer bonk a lotta gals while their crops suffer) I wouldn't be dissin' that Mickey thread on account of Dr. B and Dr F 'opinions'. You will learn more from that thread than one hundred personal consults with either of those docs, their reps, or their disciples. Why? Because the doc's don't know? Of course not. They both know infinitely more than all of us combined. But they won't play ping-pong with us willy-nilly. Much of what they know is implicit, can surface in a context that is not defined or restricted, and thus is dangerous in the hands and fingers of overly agitated posters like myself. No fodder for a loose cannon, please, especially when dollars and sense mix. To a doc. strip and FUE both have their place. It makes perfect sense to say that, to KNOW that. It is real and it is true from a clinics perspective. As a consumer, the danger lies not in the question, "Does a strip scar have a place on my head?" (a very sensible question) but in the cards of information are stacked and interpreted by them in that limited window of attention they have to apply to the task of 'shopping around' Little do they know that the 'consensus' rapidly changes year-to- year. "Dr. F. told me 'both strip and FUE have their place. OK, I'm fine with that. Now what?" ...and the frame is defined..it looks solid going forward. All these silly little bickerings are interpreted through that initial template. It's a shame that newbies don't want to look back in time and see how fast the market adapts, how rapidly things can change. You buy a product, then a few weeks later, a brand new revolutionary model is released. i'm sure that in 1905, the sales team at Stanley Cars would tell 'em, 'Both Steam and Gasoline cars have their place' Steam cars themselves, of the regular variety, much much faster than gasoline cars for many decades and with more torque but rapidly faded. Who wants to set up steam in the garage before picking up a quart of milk? Is strip a steam car? No. But it does build pressure within a head, with time.

Caddy, I can only speak for myself, I agree these seem silly from the outside, and I seem silly a lot of the time too. But there is one big lie that keeps getting perpetuated by the reps, that strip and fue have a stable relationship, that it has always been, and always will be that way, and it is BS. Helping a newbie become aware of that is good in my book. I don't always go about it well. (see above! llol) Of course strip gets you big fat hair fast,. Just saying.