shadowcast

I asked Dr. Pinto about this because I thought it was weird too and I think he said some fin may have additives that could increase bleeding. I think it’s just an overly cautious preliminary measure. Ask him before surgery if you’re curious. 

Too much stressing in this thread. I flew home to the US the day after surgery with Dr Pinto - 8 hours. It's really not a big deal. Few things:

1. I wouldn't worry about wearing a hat - nobody will stare at you. I even went through a pre-flight Covid test and the nurse who stuck a swab up my nose didn't give me an odd look or anything.
2. Don't worry about spraying your grafts during the flight, you don't have to (Pinto will tell you this himself). I didn't spray until I got home, and my hair grew perfectly.
3. Window seat is probably ideal but it doesn't really matter. Really, how many times have you ever bumped your head on a flight? Probably never.

That's it, it'll just be a normal flight. You'll be fine. No need to stress about anything, especially since you're going to Pinto, the surgery itself will be a breeze. Try the chicken sandwich from hotel room service, it's pretty good (comes with fries).

Lorenzo does not do extractions and now in some cases does not even do the implantation. I will say that good technicians can give you a perfect result as well but having experienced both techs and doctors working on me, you can feel the difference in the confidence of a doctor's hands.

On 11/5/2023 at 10:11 PM, SD1984 said:

What do you mean? Longer style as in rock star long? Or Brad Pitt Once Upon a Time in Hollywood long?

Whatever works, my point is that your hair is very short and you're styling the hair straight up in the front - both things will exacerbate your problem.

4 hours ago, SD1984 said:

I'm about 95% sure I won't be lowering the hairline at this point, but sadly I'm still having a few final greedy thoughts...

I'm exactly like you - high hair line/big forehead, had two successful surgeries and although tempted, decided not to lower my hairline at all. In my opinion, a different hairstyle would go a long way for you. Have you considered a longer style? I've been growing my hair for almost a year now, and it's made a huge difference for me.

I also live in the US, went to Pinto last summer. Perfect experience/results. Just send them an email, they have a patient coordinator who will handle everything for you.

Not really, I think some doctors would like to wait around 5-6 months so that they can assess the first transplanted area when you come back to do the second, and then potentially do a touch up at the same time as your second surgery.

So Couto has moved to having others do implantation as well, interesting.

21 hours ago, xtl said:

I'm about to book surgery with Dr. Lorenzo and have been emailing his clinic various questions. One of the things I asked is how long I need to sleep in an upright position and they replied that there is no need - I can sleep "normally". Has anyone else heard this from either that clinic or another one? Everything I've read says to sleep at a 30-90 degree angle for 5-15 days (the numbers vary from source to source).

The only reason to sleep at an angle is to help the fluids drain from your face so you don't look bloated. If you don't mind a puffy face for ~5 days then you can sleep normally, just don't sleep on the recipient area.

On 6/30/2023 at 8:56 PM, mtb said:

<photos snipped>

5.5 months. At the gym again. The lighting makes it looks great.

Looks good so far. Give it another 2-3 months of growth + maybe a little more length and the right product and you'll probably be astounded at how good it'll look.

On 6/24/2023 at 8:15 PM, HappyMan2021 said:

2) A dirty little secret is that recipient hair is often taken from outside the definitive safe zone. A NW3 who a doctor determines will never ever become say a NW6, may choose to more liberally take hair from outside the true hair zone.

I don't believe that this is true, at least I don't think reputable doctors do this knowingly or unknowingly. Once you're at NW3 level, I would guess that your full miniaturization zone is already visible while using a scope. Miniaturization can be seen with a scope many years before it's apparent to the naked eye.

Anyway to address this thread, I'd guess that it comes down to genetics. Is your hairloss aggressive? Is your response to medication below average? If both answers are "yes", then your hair transplant may not last. Expect the possibility of total loss, no loss, or everything in between.

As someone who was heading to NW7, I take dutasteride and oral minoxidil every single day.

This really needs an update.

15 hours ago, marchtop said:

To be clear, I was willing to continue both surgeries in India and Mexico through the pain, but both surgeons refused to continue (Hippocratic oath or something).

If you feel pain then your heart rate will increase and so will the bleeding, this is a basic reason why the surgery can't be performed without anesthetic.

As for solutions to your problem, I can't think of any. I've heard of clinics putting people under, but that seems like an unnecessary risk for cosmetic surgery.

Looks great, right on track.

Why would you want to do a FUT rather than FUE? Why not touch the crown whirl? After 13 months dut/8 months min you will likely not have further growth, certainly nothing miraculous. Forget this "illusion of density" stuff, ~6k grafts with a good doctor would do you wonders. A good doctor will rebuild your whirl, not replace it. Consider yourself lucky that you have good response to medication and a healthy donor, and just go for a big FUE.

13 hours ago, Shadman said:

Because when ever anyone is sleeping he has no control over yourself. Consequently, without even knowing he can damage the newly transplanted grafts.

I had this issue, I took swipes at my head in my sleep. I eventually learned to sleep wearing rubber gloves. This will stop your nails from doing damage. I found that this gave me enough cushion that I'd wake up before doing damage.

I have the same gap effect in my crown/against my sidewall (right side when photographed top down). This is actually normal. With the way shingling works, as hairs angle out and exit the swirl, they will naturally lie in a way that exposes the most scalp. Opposite is true as the swirl folds in and maximum shingling occurs - this area will look very dense, so much so that if you photograph yourself from behind (not top down), you will likely see a nice big hump of hair on that side. I originally thought I had poor growth on one side, but Dr. Bruno Pinto explained all this to me and even showed me on a scope how my growth was perfect.

I think what you are seeing is about right for 1,700 grafts, which is absolutely not close to enough to what you need in that crown.

Another thing, careful analyzing crown photographs too much. The crown is of course a spherical shape, so looking at 2D photographs will give you odd perspectives that don't relate to how things look in reality.

3 hours ago, Jupiter_ said:

I have seen some negative reviews about dr Lorenzo, about low yields, doing mutliple surgeries per day and using different techs for his procedures with unknown experience..So i am but confused since it seems that he has lowered the quality the last years compared to the past.

I had surgery with him in 2021, result was good. However I think it's a bit of a gamble with his clinic, as Lorenzo himself seems unstable. One of his techs told me he's "always angry". The clinic was very busy and quite hectic. I would never go back, especially for the premium price he charges.

Also want to add that it's a sad fact but apparently true that track record means nothing anymore. Look at Lorenzo's clinic. Even great doctors get lazy and greedy.

5 hours ago, Sunset Dune said:

It’s Canada not USA and the problem isn’t with the clinic, if you look at this patients prior hair before transplant they were just trying to emulate his original hair design which already had unusual temple points and if you take into consideration his head shape is very long which does affect temples and hairline design. It really wasn’t the doctors fault here. Hasson is an excellent surgeon his track record proves it and his clinic is by far one of the best in the world.

Good point re: Canada, please swap out the part where I said "USA" with "North America". Disagree with everything else you said. No human on earth would have temple points like a clothes hook, no competent doctor would underestimate by that many grafts. I think someone else raised this point elsewhere in the thread, if this surgery occurred in Turkey the doctor would be crucified.

34 minutes ago, Ralph kaka said:

Thank you so much @shadowcast. Really appreciate it. 2 questions for you:

1.) I am staying at home for 7 days in a temperature controlled environment, ranging from 68-72 degree F depending on how I feel. Today I sweat a little for like half an hour before I turned the AC on. Then I did my day spray. Could sweat like this hurt the grafts?

2.) Also, what are the risks with flying? My flight is on day 8 post op-could it somehow dry out the grafts and lose them? Should I perhaps stay where I am longer?

Ty!

1. The grafts are in your body, ambient temperature doesn't matter. Sweat will not hurt the grafts. Just don't touch the grafts with your hands (infection risk) and don't lose any grafts from rubbing or bumping your head. That's all you have to do.

2. I flew home on an 8 hour flight the day after my surgery, didn't spray my head once during the flight. Everything grew perfectly. At 8 days you should be fully healed and scabs will likely already have come off, there is nothing you can do at that point to ruin the surgery.

You don't have to spray the grafts, it just helps with the scabbing.

You can sleep without any angle, I did this because I literally cannot fall asleep unless I am physically comfortable. Slept on my side/on my cheek through crown, mid scalp, hair line, and temple surgery. No issues. Probably made the swelling take a little longer to go down, but who cares? You're not going out in public during that time anyway. Only thing I'd highly recommend is to wear rubber gloves once you get to the stage where your donor starts to itch. I found myself taking swipes at my itchy areas in my sleep.

I think if you come in with a strong opinion on how you want your hairline/corners/temples, and you're not being unrealistic, then Pinto will do that for you. I think the conservative stuff you see from him is just his tendency to go "natural" when people come in without a specific design in their head. This was basically me, Pinto drew a hairline on me and I was just like "yep that works" without giving it a ton of scrutiny. During the initial growth phase, I started to have regrets thinking I should've pushed him to be more aggressive and symmetrical. Now that my hair has grown in AND has some length to it, I see that his eye for what would look good on me was actually perfect.

6 hours ago, Calihome1 said:

Did you document your surgery with him? If so, Can you send me the link?

No I didn't document it. Couldn't be happier though.

Dr. Pinto is the man, I'd never want to have surgery with anyone else.