asterix0

Stopping minoxidil for prolonged periods of time caused your hair loss. It was foolish advice to quit it for months, you should have restarted it 10 days after the operation.

What's done is done now. I don't see any egregiously thick grafts so probably it will be ok. However, the density doesn't appear to match your native density behind the transplant. This is of course normal for transplants, they cannot replicate native density. Anyway, It is really hard for anyone to say how this will turn out, you will just have to be patient and judge the results in 6 months or so.

Post op looks pretty decent actually. Of course like others have said, time will tell how it turns out. OP needs to keep in mind, his cousin may have gotten a good result, but a lot of terrible clinics can turn out a decent result from time to time. It is a bit like pro tennis or pro golf. An amateur golfer can hit a good shot from time to time, just as good as a top pro. But over time, consistency of good/excellent results is what separates the pros from the rest.

Also, you have a very thick beard. This can definitely be utilized in your midscalp and crown, and you can save the best grafts in your donor area for your hairline. You can probably get 3000 grafts from your beard.

OP I think your donor area was pretty good, I stand by that and anyone who says otherwise is trying to blow smoke to be honest. To me this is a sub par result and if anyone here does enough research, this clinic unfortunately is resting on past laurels, has recently tried to overpack areas that many other elite clinics could do with 33% less grafts, and get better yields from the looks of it. This site has the more recent results and these threads are available for us to see, I won't like them here as I don't have time presently but someone else can look at the last 3-4 years or so and post links if they like. I heard that they are not doing 1 patient a day anymore, seems to be trending to the hair mill direction with minimal surgeon involvement in the extraction/incision phases. You did everything right OP in my opinion, did your due diligence, unfortunately the clinic didn't serve you properly and you probably could have gotten a similar result in Turkey for 1/10th the price. As for next steps, I recommend you consider FUEgenix in the Netherlands, some of the Spanish doctors with longer waiting lists, perhaps Dr. Feirreira in Portugal.

Your case is quite surprising and interesting. I don't know of any cases where the extra dht protection of oral finasteride failed to "boost" the dht resistance of the transplanted donor hair. Actually your donor, from your other thread, looks pretty healthy too.

I made posts about this, nobody here really credited it seriously, but it is a concern.

@general-etwan, you would be looking at over 50 thousand euros to get the coverage you need, probably close to 60 thousand euros if you went with Dr. Zarev.

Any updates @sid87?

Honestly, just accept that a good result is probably a flip of a coin at any of these low budget places. Look yourself in the mirror and tell yourself if getting botched is worth it, and how much your hair loss is really affecting you to roll the dice. A botched hair transplant, needing repairs just to look normal again, is much worse than doing nothing. Just think, why would a clinic undercut themselves and charge less if you were getting similar quality to the better clinics. This is a pretty efficient market, you get what you pay for (usually).

This is what allows for more grafts to be taken, because optically to the human eye we look for patterns/discrepancies, which cannot be found so easily when you do homogenous extraction over the entire viable donor.

Shock loss can destroy miniaturized hairs for sure, because they are already weak and on the way out, so to speak. The problem is, when a surgeon is transplanting over a non-bald area, there is only so much he can place in a first pass around these weakened hairs. It is pretty much impossible to predict which will survive and which won't. So, this is why many times a second surgery is needed for density.

@general-etwan Unfortunately for aggressive hair loss sufferers finasteride isn't enough. I am one too, I kept losing hair on finasteride and minoxidil from my early 20s, and now I am in my early 30s. I would be slick bald if I didnt take them however, and saving as much native hair as possible is always a good thing. Your sides may very well drop because you are destined to reach Norwood 7 fully. I don't know if dutasteride is enough to even stop it, but it can always be tried.

So yeah I think some light SMP in your donor if you keep that short on the sides cut would really complete the look. But probably isn't even necessary to do that.

We can notice it because we know what we are looking for, but I think the average guy on the street wouldnt know. Nevertheless, it's a good example of a better case scenario of what happens if you shave your head after a transplant.

Congratulations. Just goes to show how important patience is, especially going from months 3 to 4, people start getting nervous and expecting early growth, and panic instead of trusting the process.

It can happen but it all depends on the individual patient, your DHT sensitivity, how aggressive your loss is, etc. The Donor hair is DHT resistant, not DHT proof for everyone. If you want to play it safe, take finasteride or a different anti androgen.

So actually, for a diffuse thinner, a buzz cut makes things less noticeable because the hair is more orderly. Since you now have a hairline to frame your face it could potentially be a winning combination with smp. What is important though is to pick the right smp clinic, and have them make it subtle. Light smp of the donor and recipient will look much more natural than full blown smp which most of the time is very obvious in person, due to it being shiny and eventually changing cover over time. So, long story short, light, spaced out smp that makes you look a little balding overall is the way to go. As Dr. Zarev said for example, it is much better for a transplant to look natural than it is to have either very high density, or a very straight hairline, or anything else that would make the common person think twice when they see it.

Everyone grows a little differently so just stay patient, keep in mind usually for larger sessions the growth may be a bit slower, maybe @Melvin- Admin can correct me if I am wrong there.

How many grafts do you need? Have you consulted Dr. Bisanga, Hattingen Clinic, Dr Ahmad in the Netherlands?

Right on the money, and this was my own experience as well.

FUT is a more invasive procedure and has a higher risk for complications regarding healing. Yes, the risk is still small, but as your nerves are regenerating in the region where the wound was created, sometimes things can be more permanent depending on your own physiology and healing predispositions.

A bald head doesnt look that great either, you have to pick your poison in this world unfortunately.

Btw have you gotten a hair transplant, FUE or FUT?

Ah I see, now this makes sense. I actually did not know case G is possible, so that is good that I learned something today hehe.