Fox243

2 hours ago, general-etwan said:

So the only way it could potentially be effective on old scars (all the ones I already have) is to re-injure the sites and then use verteporfin on it? 

Potentially, but there's been no research showing that it can be effective on old scars iirc. I think it should work, but that's pure speculation.

11 minutes ago, general-etwan said:

Had to read up on it; have been so busy with life I hadn't known about this. 

Sounds promising but also almost like magic. Preventing scarring and improving skin quality I can see, but regenerating hair follicles? Sounds like something David Blaine or Criss Angel would do. Through all the ideas over the years of regenerating or cloning hair follicles, I could never wrap my head around it logically. To me a hair follicle is a real, tangible object locked in place in matter (skin) and if moved, it remains a single object in its new place and nothing suddenly reappears in its old place. If we could actually produce regeneration in that manner, then I think we have to question our entire understanding of the universe itself. How can something come of nothing? Well, that's the deepest question of all in terms of how this universe began in the first place, isn't it? 😂

Like others said in the verteporfin thread, even if it just prevents scarring, that's a big deal.

Definitely interested in learning more about it. Will be in touch.

Trust me, even after studying this for 1.5 years, I'm still shocked. But I, like you, am extremely analytical and this is the #1 shot at greatly increasing our chances for more hair. It only hasn't caught more attention mainstream b/c it requires surgery, but the audience at HRN is the perfect candidate for it. The way I see it, people using verteporfin have got nothing to lose and only things to gain. 

4 minutes ago, general-etwan said:

I don't know if I agree that mtb and I are clearly distinct NW 6 vs 7. Can you explain what you mean by the borders are different? I think they're more the same than different.

If you look closely, we both have characteristics of both 6 and 7, so I think it kind of just ends up blurring together. 

https://naturaltransplants.com/solutions/norwood-scale/norwood-6/
https://naturaltransplants.com/solutions/norwood-scale/norwood-7/

 

 

We both have a had extremely similar very weak remaining lock on the top of the head (black), have a very similar area of final thinning (red), have similar thinning above and behind the ear (blue), and my border, if at all lower than his, is negligibly lower. The small difference seen here (yellow lines) has to account for mtb's image being taken from a slightly higher angle than mine. Call it NW 6 or 7, at the end of the day I say we were both NW6s at the time with very similar final border patterns. 

A traditional surgeon would look at mtb and say his loss could dip lower with age too, just as they would mine. But apparently Zarev was not concerned with that and/or does not think so.

Yeah, the Zarev patient there got a very high hairline and no temple work. I agree the more youthful approach to me was very necessary at my age, and it still was relatively conservative. I think I have enough grafts for more work to try to homogenous this as much as possible. Some scalp for sure, and definitely beard if needed.

If I were you, I'd try to wait for more trials with verteporfin or if you're impatient, I can try to ask Dr. Barghouthi to use verteporfin for you. We are not sure if verteporfin can be used on old scars, which is why it might be important to use it on the few grafts you have left.

I've been leading the verteporfin efforts for 1.5 years now, and I'm happy to help you over DM.

3 minutes ago, general-etwan said:

Makes sense that it's donor management, of course, but going forward, I say take the 500 more needed for the temple gaps that show when buzzed. 500 isn't a travesty. 1,000 would be. 

In that picture, I had gone a few weeks without buzzing the sides and temples. I want to say 2-3 weeks. 

I just think going forward, I really want to push for maximum homogenous distribution of hair and closing any gaps. Now that these remaining gaps are visible, and I am personally pretty confident that we can see the boundary of where hair loss will mostly stop at the back of the crown (yes we know it can dip slowly over a lifetime, but it's not going to dip suddenly anytime soon because all of my original hair that is significantly harmed by DHT has already suffered that effect by age 30 due to how extreme my loss is and the full pattern can be seen at this point; that's what I believe)...I will need any gaps closed in order to maximize the situation. If things are pretty homogenous then I can always buzz my hair or minimally fade it myself to keep it looking acceptable without having to need complex fades every week. And SMP could then be used all over very subtly to increase illusion of density. 

You just look at results like this, and say how is this possible...well it must be possible.

 

There's also a huge difference between Zarev and Eugenix. Zarev has 3 hour long consultations with extremely detailed measurements where he does every part of the procedure while Eugenix is like most other top HT clinics. You will be sacrificing ~15% of quality when choosing Zarev vs the standard package at Eugenix or any other shop (H&W, etc)

22 minutes ago, takuma said:

He's already shown pictures of before... he's been documenting with pictures since the beginning of the experiment. Dr Bargouthi has been very consistent with updating both with pictures, and data including a lab analysis. 

Yes, Dr. Barghouthi has gone above and beyond, way more than what I would’ve ever thought for a first trial. Remember he has no obligation to be sharing anything with the public. He could’ve just shared the results in the end and got a 5 year waiting list and doubled his prices once he perfected the technique. 
 

There’s nothing wrong with being critical – in fact being critical is what leads to improvements. However, the criticism should be constructive and not dooming - feels like a lot of criticism is trying to nitpick every little detail and making a mountain out of a molehill. 

29 minutes ago, DrTBarghouthi said:

Hi guys,

Hope you’re keeping well. Apologies for keeping you waiting again. It was a busier than usual period in the last few weeks and I just landed in India for the annual hair conference. 
As mentioned in a previous post, I continue to see the consistent difference between injected and control sites. I think the 0.4 area has been showing the best overall progress- but I also think that we do notice changes in the other doses too. The zoomed out 0.4 area looks to me untouched- but that’s only my subjective judgement. 
I was also happy to see the 0.24 mg area catching up to show better visual recovery and that might be due to the fact that this area had tumescent fluids injected in it, leading to vasoconstriction. This might be leading to a more localised effect of Verteporfin in the region. I have uploaded the photos here. 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As for future trials, I had one planned for the 24 th October, but I pushed him back because of the conference. I thought it would be important to follow him closely in the first few weeks and I didn’t want to be away in his initial recovery. We agreed to do it in November as he also has no travel commitments or difficulties with regular follow ups. We also have another patient who will be potentially having Verteporfin in November along with his procedure. 
 

I think the optimal dosing is not too far off. I am still keen on increasing the dose slightly- or at least in some areas. 
 

Dang we might be cured bois

6 minutes ago, Melvin- Admin said:

 

This video was released two months ago, so something isn’t adding up. How could he have done his first update two months ago and only be at one month.

 

He’s been lagging with the videos. The video you’re referring to is the day of the operation. His newest video just released the one month results. He will be releasing the 3 month results over the next few weeks. 

5 minutes ago, Melvin- Admin said:

I’m not too convinced with the FUT trial. There’s an improvement, but not enough to warrant all the cost and linear scarring. Of course, it’s a preliminary trial, further studies are needed.

We’ve only seen one month of results – think we need to wait till month 4 or so for a better assessment. 

Hi @DrTBarghouthi, would love when to hear when you think you could share the photos.

14 hours ago, anxious6 said:

Hi all. I wasn't going to post anything here, but I see there's a lot of continued interest in Dr. Zarev and I feel I owe this community a lot in terms of researching my options to make an informed decision. Apologies if the write up is a little shorter and the pictures aren't the same quality others have provided. 

I'm 34 and first noticed hair loss at 18 or 19. I was a norwood 3 by 22 and then made a steady progression to a norwood 6 by around age 30. Apart from brief stints on minoxidil I was not on medication during this time. That was such a dumb mistake. Anyway, I've been on oral finasteride + topical minoxidil for a couple of years now and actually have seen stabilization and a tiny bit of regrowth, though not enough to make a significant cosmetic impact. My father's side of the family is all Norwood 1s and 2s - my grandfather had a thick ronald reagan head of hair at 89 - but mother's side is all norwood 5 - 7s. 

I made the decision about a year ago to get a hair transplant after seeing some of the surprisingly strong results from Eugenix and Hasson and Wong on this forum for people with Norwood 6+ patterns. I had consultations with Eugenix, H&W, Pitella and C*le. I had reached out several times to Zarev during this time, based on Hugo's results, but had not gotten a response. In February I sent in two final messages through his website (one in English and one in my best-attempted translation to Bulgarian) letting him know I'd be interested and willing to pay off schedule pricing. A couple of weeks later his coordinator reached out and set up a call with Dr. Zarev and requested more pictures. Dr. Zarev and I then spoke a few weeks after that for about half an hour on the phone about the photos, his techniques, family history of hair loss, etc. He said he thought i would be a candidate based on pictures / discussion, however there was no way for him to know without seeing me in person. He agreed to try and fit me in if they had a cancellation, but I would need to arrive 3+ days beforehand for an in person consultation as part of the same trip, and there was a real possibility I would get there and he would determine I was not a fit. I agreed. In early May I got a call asking if I could make it in for a 6/2 consultation followed by surgery on 6/5 and 6/6 if all checked out.

I'm not sure I have much to add to MTB's experience with Dr. Zarev in person. My consult with him lasted 2+ hours, most of which was taking pictures and taking measurements. We then talked about potential progression of loss. While it was apparent to me in my photos that my crown was dipping very low and wide, Dr. Zarev also let me know that my sides could dip further as well, which I did not know going in. If so, he estimated that in my final pattern and with an age appropriate / not overly high hairline I would likely need 13,500 - 14,000 total grafts for the coverage and density he thought was satisfactory, however I only have ~12,500 available without over depleting the donor area. At some point down the road I might have to make the choice between a thinner crown or over depleting the donor area and keep the side shaved at a 1 - 2 guard from that point forward, similar to the norwood 7 results that have been discussed on this forum. I was fine with either scenario as it was better than i had been expecting when I first started researching this. With that he agreed to move forward.  

Surgery both days started with a  10am arrival, roughly an 11am surgery start and we did not finish til after midnight. Roughly 3800 grafts each day. Dr. Zarev is the only one touching your head throughout the surgery. Sitting / lying there for that long is uncomfortable, but I didn't feel almost any pain throughout the process. Upon wrapping up the second day We ended up with a  total of about 7700 grafts. I should know the exact number but I can't remember exactly - I'll go back and check with Dr. Zarev in my next monthly update with him to confirm because I might be off by 100 in either direction. 

Like an idiot i bumped my head getting out of the cab going back to the hotel. I was distraught, but the next day, when i came back in for my first wash, Dr. Zarev said I had lost 10 grafts. He offered to re-implant there, but said it would not make a noticeable cosmetic difference, even though they were all clustered together at the convergence of midscalp and crown. I decided not to do anything else. From there my head swelled up like a balloon and then subsided over the 8 days post surgery in Sofia. I traveled back to the US on Day 9 post op and washed off my scabs the next day. Assuming all goes well we will be looking for a date to go back around month 10 for a second session. 

I feel like I have had slower growth than Hugo or MTB, and that kind of freaked me out around month 3. Ha, I know that it's within the normal range not to have any real growth showing at month 3, but given Hugo's insane amount of early growth and MTB's promising early returns, I was pretty worried. Then about 3.5 mos in things started to pick up. I'm at 4 month and 8 days now, and it's crazy to look back at how much has changed in that time. I still have a long way to go, but I'm not nearly as concerned as I was before. One last thing, is that even though it is difficult to get in touch with Dr. Zarev initially, once you are a patient he is very responsive. At the very least we text on whatsapp about progress each month and he's called me twice to check in. 

So that should wrap it up. I'll post pics below when I get a chance later today. 

 

 

Thanks for the writeup. Why did you not use beard grafts?

57 minutes ago, sansi said:

IMO it should regenerate hair in FUT also, but big amount of skin is being sutured into very narrow one, so regrowth would be much smaller that what was originally taken. Hair in strip line would be very good indicator of regrowth potential.

Agreed, the FUT should actually have a better chance of regrowing hair because of increasing Shh signaling in a deeper wounds. It’s similar to how unsuccessful attempts have been made to apply Verteporfin after microneedling – the deeper the wound, the better the results.

Looks great for 4500 grafts.

9 minutes ago, Melvin- Admin said:

This thread is going off the rails. This is a novel approach by a doctor who has nothing to gain but help the community. I’ve been very tolerant, but I won’t be moving forward. If you guys don’t believe in this or the doctor. Don’t post. No one is forcing you to follow. 

The comments have not been respectful. I expect we all show some gratitude and respect to Dr. Barghouthi whose doing his best. After all, he’s a hair transplant surgeon, not a clinical researcher. His priority is and should be his clinic.

Also, stop touting someone else’s donation as a way to demand something.  Dr. Barghouthi doesn’t owe you, me or anyone anything. Each day of surgery he’s missed on this trial, on top of the cost of paying his employees and the Verteporfin. I guarantee, it’s well over what anyone has donated. 

Agreed, I am very thankful for Dr. Barghouthi, and if anyone wants to blame anyone, please blame me for requesting Dr. Barghouthi to postpone the trial in hopes for Dr. Longaker sharing any critical info.

3 minutes ago, DrTBarghouthi said:

Hi guys,

I have few updates:

1. I have a scheduled follow up with the first trial for this coming Wednesday. The patient had several work trips and so our schedules weren’t working well. Hopefully we will have an update on him this Wednesday.

2. In view of Dr. Bloxham’s recent trial and him trying higher doses of Verteporfin, I think there is a potential to trial even higher doses to see if the effects can be optimized with higher doses or we should be maintaining a narrow range of testing. I have booked the trial for the 24th of October but my Volunteer patient is having constant difficulties with time off work. He is an ideal candidate- so I don’t want to give up on him yet. Hopefully we will have that done with him on that date. 
3. I have also scheduled another trial for November 21 with another patient who is also having a full FUE. 
As mentioned earlier, I have the Verteporfin ready for both of these trials. 

I'm quite excited for this, especially the 1.5 year update

Any updates here?

1 hour ago, Melvin- Moderator said:

Hey Guys,

Sorry, for some reason I wasn’t following the thread, so I wasn’t seeing notifications. 

Unfortunately, no, he canceled again. I won’t be reaching out to him again. 

Unlucky, but thanks for the update! 

40 minutes ago, Dr. Felipe Pittella said:

This is one of the most important comment so far.

Would you say its possible to have a result like this if you're only willing to take topical minoxidil and not oral minoxidil if you're NW7?

22 minutes ago, Arcturus9 said:

Hi @Fox243, any chance I could be added to that discord? Is it public or are there any kind of requirements?

Yes, I can add you. Requirements are to have either invested enough time or money into furthering Verteporfin. I will DM you an invite link after my shift ends.

On 9/11/2023 at 3:40 PM, Melvin- Moderator said:

Sorry guys I’ve been editing it. It should be available this week..

Thanks for the update! You're the GOAT. 

1 minute ago, Turkhair said:

Do not bother with meds. If your hairloss is stable you have reached your final Norwood pattern. Meds will only do slight improvement at this stage and not worth it. 

Your plan is good but NW1 is ambitious, can only get NW2.

1. FUT is such a dated technique, I hate the ugly scar it leaves. Some people still prefer it but meh. You look good now but when you get old and your skin isn’t so nice, that scar going to be look hideous. Look at Joe Rogan, just hideous.

2. Zarev. Pitella. Eugenix

3. Sure if you’ve a massive beard and don’t mind thinned look behind hairline in some places (midscalp/crown). 12k grafts. 

4. Don’t bother and condemn yourself to a life of drugs. You’re too far gone 

I would agree with all of this, but I would say even NW2 is too ambitious. I think NW2.5-3 is more reasonable

@Melvin- ModeratorYes, just checking in about this. Completely understand if it wasn’t possible to have the podcast, but would appreciate transparency on if this was even the case. 

15 hours ago, Will_the_way said:

Because they would slide right out of your scalp, and they would never grow. 

Do we need them to grow? Can’t they basically just function as a wig that is your own hair and won’t come off since it’s surgically implanted? 
 

I’ve acknowledged it’s an unconventional question, but if we never ask these sorts of questions, we’ll never make progress in hair restoration. 

Dumb question, but why can’t doctors implant strands of hair from the back of your head (not the hair follicles themselves) into the bald areas?

1 hour ago, Melvin- Moderator said:

UPDATE: 

Dr. Longaker canceled the meeting. He was in the clinic assisting a doctor that called out. I asked his secretary for another date, but I haven’t received a response. I will update you guys if and when she responds. 

I think we may have to push forward without his input. But lets hope he reaches out. 

I can confirm that hairdao spoke to dr Longaker but unfortunately, we got no info regarding dosages. He asked all information he shared to be kept confidential, so we can’t share anything else, but I agree that we should move forward without his input. 

1) Why does he do FUE for mega sessions? He’s very mathematical and mathematically, an FUT should lead to more lifetime grafts because you are taking all the healthy follicles from an entire row. 
 

2) How many NW7s has he done and for what percent does he use beard hair?