OneMission06

I'm sorry to hear about how much your are suffering. At least you have a diagnosis of neurogenic pain. In addition to PRP, another treatment option to research is an occipital nerve block. Hopefully you continue to make improvements with the gabapentin.

I am currently about 11 days post op from a 1500 graft FUE procedure. I had minimal pain for the first few days, but beginning on post op day 5 I began experiencing moderate to severe pain in my donor region with very similar symptoms to what you describe. I did not want to take narcotics and Aleve wasn't doing it for me. My wife happens to be a pain doctor and she prescribed Emla cream, which is a lidocaine cream. I applied it copiously to the area about 2x/day. It absolutely took the edge off, and seems to have calmed the nerve endings. I have been using it for about 3 days now. While I can still feel the symptoms, I no longer consider it painful. Your pain sounds more severe and chronic, but it might be worth a shot if you haven't tried it yet.

This might help shed some light on this issue. There was a recent European study looking at the long term affects of dutasteride. It consisted of 2340 patients who were followed for four years. The investigators concluded that the adverse side effects were similar to those of finasteride. The study, however, did not address the efficacy of the drug in the treatment of androgenic allopecia, since its only official use is for benign prostatic hypertrophy. Here is the reference if anyone is interested in reading further: BJU Int. 2006 Jan;97(1):73-9; discussion 79-80

The doc I met was a very reputable doc out of NY. I did discuss dutasteride with him, but he does not recommend the drug because there aren't satisfactory trials to support its safety profile. Are there other doctors who would prescribe avodart for MPB refractory to propecia? OneMission06

I'm in a very similar situation to many of you posting. I'm 25 y/o and my once perfect hairline now looks like the Italian peninsula. I have been on propecia for 13-14 months without any slowing of my hair loss. I consulted two HT surgeons for an evaluation. Although the first guy was willing to perform the surgery I decided to get another consult (actually never met him, only met his educator). I recently saw a more reputable doc, one who is discussed frequently on this site. He advised that I was not ready for the procedure because of my age and unpredicatbility of future loss. I respect him tremendously for his honest advice. However, he did recommend that I increase the dosage of propecia I was taking because 1mg was the recommended dose for the average 150lb man. Since I weigh nearly 200lbs he told me to take 2mg/day, and gave me a prescription for proscar since its cheaper (I asked for it). He advised me to take 1 pill every other day, which is a dose of 2.5mg finasteride/day. What have other peoples' experiences been with increasing doseages? As I am hoping for improved results, I am also aware of the greater likelihood of side effects. Anyone's experience would be valuable to hear about.

I haven't yet followed up. I will do more research before I go ahead with the procedure. If I follow up I will let you know.

I have been reading lots of the threads on this site and think they're great. I've learned so much and feel prepared to ask the right questions before I get the surgery. I met with Dr. Pistone's hair restoration educator last week for a consultation. He was a nice guy and described Dr. Pistone's work in detail. Although I am confident he does top notch work, there is a lack of his patients on this site. That is concerning because he claims to have performed over 8000 of these surgeries, and the number of Docs doing microscopic HT is relatively small. Is this indicative at all of his work? Do you guys recommend consultations with numerous doctors prior to making a decision, even if it requires going to NY? I'd appreciate any suggestions.