Bandit90

To compare Eugenix to a hair mill is a bit unjust! Anybody who has been to Eugenix will know that there is plenty of doctors presence beyond the leading surgeons!

I can totally empathise with your situation, I too never experienced a full head of hair in adult life to balding at 15 years old! I agree, with other posters you are going to need a least two surgeries and give up some beard hair, but it's a small price to pay for a good result! I too started for a similar position to yourself. I have just come out my first procedure with Dr Sethi in March, and going for round two in October. But I can hand on heart say it was the best decision i've ever made!

Month 2 Update Right in the middle of the ugly duckling phase, therefore not a huge amount to update on. Redness is still there, hopefully it starts to fade within the next month. The wild hairs are starting to make an appearance!

It's hard to believe that two and half years ago you were a norwood 6/7. One great clinic and a 11.6k grafts later here you are astonishing us all month by month! Karl, you have redefined HT expectations from us fellow high norwood's!

Great write up Ryan! I’m so happy for you. The work looks so clean. I have every confidence this will be yet another Eugenix home run result!

Nice detailed write up Ryan (and thanks for the mention!). I can't wait for you to start your Eugenix journey. You are a very knowledgeable guy which is evident through conversation and posts on here. You have done your research well and will reap the rewards in your choice of doctor and clinic. I know that Dr Pradeep & Dr Arika will take great care of you over there and make it an experience you won't forget. The cloud hanging over from your poor previous transplants is about to disappear! PS I cant see the pictures too!

But blended in well beard hair is an excellent filler for the scalp, we have so many examples of this now! Appreciate not everyone has a great beard. But generally speaking a higher Norwood is likely to have a strong beard. Taking a step back here, on reflection I am probably behaving biased, as I chose the FUE + BHT route to restore my advanced hair loss.

I would say that a 20% transaction rate in todays day and age is extremely high. With use of implanter pens, clinics are boasting yields in the high 90% with FUE. Even with numbers you have crunched, you could easily compensate with 2800 grafts with beard hair and just not even need a FUT. Generally speaking, I just cant honestly see that if you were starting a HT journey in 2022 and were a high grade, why you would want to pursue a strip.

For sure. But I guess now we now have a 3rd dimension in hair restoration with BHT, so it can’t really be ignored . The reality is that a Norwood 7 with poor donor can get reasonable coverage with FUE + BHT. Therefore, an OP has a choice whether they want the same end result, with or without a linear scar.

Just to play devils advocate. The Sharpio study looks at simply FUT then FUE for graft maxing. With FUE + BHT you can restore a Norwood 7, so in principle the Hypothesis has now evolved from the study.

Haha! Many Thanks Armen!

I’m quite knew to the Hair Restoration Network. But one thing I have found alarming is the number of posters that tell often quite young & naive, higher Norwood patients who post on here for the first time seeking help, that they should undergo an FUT procedure in order to maximise grafts. With recent advancements in FUE + BHT combinations surgeries, should people not be encouraging this as a first line surgical approach for graft maxing, as opposed to undergoing a much risker FUT procedure? This is purely my take on the situation. I may be completely off the mark. Appreciate every patient is different, but to me it feels that some posters are giving outdated, counterproductive advise.

Sure! Will ask the question in my next follow up. If they don’t have it I’m back there in October for the second sitting, so will ask them if could measure.

1 month post op update Not a huge amount to report. Most hair seems to have shed now and some hairs even look to be growing. Still lots of redness in the recipient, hopefully will start to fade over the coming months. Really happy with how he donor looks, hard to tell 4000 grafts were extracted four weeks ago! Will be shaving the donor down to a number 1 at weekend. I've also took a couple of zoomed in shots on the temples, for those with the interest

I do think you have very similar hair characteristics to me in many ways, so I would certainly look at my recent surgery. I got on finasteride for a year and reached out to Eugenix. Providing you are willing to get on finasteride and give up most of your beard to offset the poor scalp donor, then in reality you will likely get reasonable coverage and more importantly a decent cosmetic improvement. Personally, knowing first hand what FUE + BHT combos can achieve for the highest grade of baldness, you will be very surprised what can be done in the hands of good doctor! There are many great doctors recommended here. From my personal perspective you should be putting Eugenix at the top of that list for a consult.

No problem at all! They didn’t tell me the micron size unfortunately! I think “brilliant” was a bit of an exaggeration by me in hindsight. In the pre-op, Dr Pradeep thought I had very poor donor and went conservative in his plan to do only 4000 grafts. However, when all shaved down for the extractions, he noted it was slightly better than he had initially thought and decided he could get 1000 more grafts out. I guess because i’m still quite fair haired it can be quite hard to assess the donor . What I would say my donor is probably still below average, but not poor as initially thought.

Cheers Daniel. It was just short of 400 grafts in each temple.

Simply Amazing Karl! Every time I see a new photo of you my jaw hits the ground with envy. Eugenix has done the impossible on you and rolled back the years! Who'd had thought the words "Hair Greed" and "Norwood 6/7" could be used in the same sentence. Couldn't wish for a better result for a better person! I owe a huge thank to you to. Your live testimonial, is what inspired me to get on that plane to Eugenix. Something which I will be forever grateful for.

I got told by Eugenix too that after 7 days the grafts are secure and you are a free person.

Good explanation! From my own personal experience, being a Norwood 7 with reverse thinning (Norwood 8 if there was such a thing lol) I am still able to get full coverage by just using scalp and beard hair with FUE. Appreciate everyone is different, but if you can give up a bit of the beard then to me FUT is an unnecessary approach for graft maxing. In Melvin's recent interview with Dr Hasson if I recall correctly, he mentioned he has only preformed 3 FUT procedures in the past 18 months, so even their focus is on FUE now.

There has been a paradigm shift in recent years, with surgeons utilising beard hair in higher norwoords, to get much more coverage via FUE. FUE does leave scaring but it's minimal so you can wear your hair much shorter. With FUT you would have to leave it long on the back to cover the scar. Please can you share the source where you have got that FUT is the gold standard? I categorically disagree with this, with recent advancements in FUE how can this even be true?

Feel your situation, I started loosing my hair at 17 to. I would certainly stress the following points. 1. Get on finasteride and stableize the hair loss. Being aged 23 you still have potential to lose more (once stabilised the surgeon will know exactly what they have to work with) 2. Educate your self, get a realistic expectation of what can be achieved with a HT. i 3. Reach out to a reputable surgeon. One who has a proven track record of restoring higher norwoods and those of a younger age. I can't stress enough the need to get on fin! It will help thicken up and save what you have left, and what has been lost can be dealt with via a HT. Also stay away from FUT surgery (or at very least educate yourself on the implications of the surgery i.e large linear scaring). Providing you get on fin and stabilise the hair loss, your age shouldn't really be an issue for a transplant. In the meantime, reach out to a recommended doctor on this forum.

Cheers! Due to the ever covid situation at the time, ended up being about a year.

I'm sure you will get a great result, Eugenix are really masters of their craft when it comes to temples. I dont think there is a clinic that even comes close when it comes to the temple reconstruction. I'm not sure on the exact rationale as to why Dr Pradeep used a higher number of grafts on my temples. I don't believe he went any denser than he usually would, i'm of the impression he needed to cover a larger area to sufficiently reconstruct. He did mention to me during the pre-op that even when the temples are really washed out (like in my case), you can still see if you look carefully where they used to be, and this is what he uses to inform his design. I'm guessing once upon a time, I must of had really big temples. This purely my take on the situation and I could be way of the mark, but I will put the question to him in our next follow up appointment.

I'm glad that I did. The bonus was that I had my donor cleaned everyday by the clinic and they did full day 7 full clean to remove the scabs. This meant that I could travel back without wearing a surgical cap. Plus after 7 days the grafts are set in place, so any accidental knocks wouldn't damage the grafts, so it gave me peace of mind.