Sean1977

Bill, I guarantee you that I am not getting paid by Armani or anyone else (my current employer might be the exception, as I am at work while logged in here) to post any comments on here. If you would like, I can provide you my myspace account or other online profiles or references to prove that I am just a normal guy. If Dr Armani would like to add me to his payroll, then I would gladly add that to my signature below. Has Armani had covert "shills" on this forum?

I don't know what the heck they mean by "non-surgical", it was surgery and I can vouch for that. lol.. I just finished going through all of the photos, and they are all labeled except for one photo which opens a new window. They should have organized them better so you had a section that was just FUE pics and then a section that was Strip pics; but at least they have labels now.. I think there was at least 4 or 5 FUE pics that were over 4,000 grafts in there and several over 3,000...

notgoing2gobald.. I don't think there are 16 clinics doing work.. it looks like there are 3 that he travels to and from, the rest are for consultations...

If you go to the alvi armani webpage, you should be able to click on photo gallery. if you "click to enlarge" the photos, they blow up and give the graft and technique used for each patient. I wish they had done this while I was doing my research, because it made it very difficult to see how many grafts gave a certain result. Not sure what you mean by shill.. but I thought this thread was titled Armani FUE. I am a patient of Armani, just as many people on here are patient's of other docs. Am I excited about Armani's work?? Of course I am, I'm hoping that my results turn out as good as I expected them to be. That is how I found this chat board and this particular article last week; I was searching for Armani FUE pics on the web to try and find more grown out results. It seems that the only way not to be considered a "shill" here is to say something negative about Armani. I'm sorry I posted a link to the page, I didn't know that wasn't allowed; but people on here seemed eager to see the FUE pics.

Hey guys.. it looks like Armani put up a new site. Appears that they FINALLY labeled each photo with the graft count and whether it was an FUE procedure or a Strip procedure. I have only looked at a couple of the pics, but I did find one FUE pic that was over 3000 grafts. I'm still looking through them... (promotional content removed)

I see the finasteride debate a little bit differently. Here is the analogy I came up with in my head to explain why this is.. Imagine a teeter-totter in your mind. On one side of the teeter-totter you have a full head of hair sitting, on the other side you have a bald head. Most people when they are young, have a full head of hair, and the teeter totter at this young age remains perfectly balanced, they are neither gaining hair or losing hair. As we age, the balding side begins to gain some weight with the help of DHT and probably a myriad of other hormones, and tips the scales on the side of balding; thus, we begin to lose some hair. The more the scale tips to the balding side, the faster we lose hair. Now introduce finasteride to the scale. Finasteride adds some counterweight to the other side of the teeter-totter, and in most people, either slows or stops hair loss. A few people even have regrowth. In my opinion, finasteride is able to rebalance the scale, and that is what stops the hairloss; in some people it perfectly balances the teeter-totter, and thus hair loss stops, in others it tips it further towards the hair side, and they see regrowth. For some people it doesn't tip it far enough, and it doesn't do as much for them, they might keep losing hair, but maybe at a slower rate than before. Using this analogy, it seems to reason that finasteride doesn't ever quit working. It simply only adds a set amount of counterweight to the scale. As we age, DHT and hormones can continue to increase and can cause the scales to slowly tip again towards the side of balding. Has finasteride failed?? No, it is still there providing the same counterweight, but may not be enough to stop hairloss at this point. In others, it may still be enough. However, one thing is for certain, once you remove the counterweight, the scales will tip even further towards the balding side, and hairloss will increase quickly. Maybe I put way too much thought into this, but since I've been researching all of this stuff over the past few years, I had to come up with something that made sense to me as I see a lot of conflicting information... Hope that helps someone..

I'm not really looking to start a thread, I actually only posted because I had some photos and knew of some other ones on the web showing FUE results, and thought I'd try to help out and post them... I'll start posting all of my photos and everything once I have results to post. As far as donor supply, i'm not planning on chasing my hair that long, if meds fail me in the next 10 to 15 years, I'll just shave my head. However, I think in 10 years there will be a lot more options than we have now.

I'm a few months shy of 31.. I was about a type III with thinning on top; headed for a Type IV with high sides and back if I didn't take meds. I forgot to ask Dr Armani about my remaining donor area as it was really late when I got out of my surgery and I was exhausted. I did ask the head tech during the procedure and he said probably about 6 to 7 thousand, but said that Dr Armani could give me a better estimate. I kept trying to get a glimpse of the extraction tool they use, but they kept it hidden from me through the entire procedure. Every time I would get up they would cover it up with a cloth.

Based on what norwood class? I guess if you assume everyone is headed to a norwood 6 or 7, then you would be correct.

He didn't go much outside of MY safe zone, and only in one small part. Believe me, I scrutinized in the mirror for several days to make sure. Most people have different size safe zones based on their individual genetics. All the guys in my family thin early in their 20's and then level off, so it was prety obvious where my safe zone was.

I don't know the exact number of hairs, but it was 4,181 grafts. They told me that on average it should be almost 2 hairs per graft. I estimate that I got somewhere around 8,000 hairs implanted. Chucky, yeah, I was a little nervous as to how close they got to the edge of my safe zone. I think there might be one small area rigth on the back of my head where they did go out of it, but for the most part all the way around my head they were right up to the edge of it.

This pic was taken about 3 or 4 days post op. My hair is completely shaven off, so it is still pretty obvious at this point, but no bleeding or anything. I actually didn't have any scabbing at all, just the redness.

This was Day 2, swollen forehead, but nothing like I was expecting. I stayed with a friend in LA, and I was up and around making lunch and dinner. No pain!!

This was taken about 11:30pm the first night, they had just finished at 10pm.

I'm a little confused why I have to "back up" any "claims" and exactly what claims I have made? All I have stated was that I was a patient and here are the photos I was sent prior to my procedure. Even if I was lying and I wasn't a patient, what claims have I made in regards to the photos? Half those patients have websites with the photos and they can be contacted directly; they'd probably even be willing to take more photos if they were asked. Armani did not take any post operative photos of me, they did take pre-op, but I have not requested them at this point. All post operative photos will have to be taken by myself as I can't afford to fly to California or Canada to have him take more every few months. Also, as I forgot to pack my 7MP camera for my trip to LA (DOH!!), all I had with me was my 2MP camera phone, and I know they are a little blurry. My apologies, and please don't rip me a new one for the quality, you guys asked for these to be posted. When I take new ones in a few months the camera will be a little better. Pre Op:

Bill, I want to wait until I start seeing some growth before posting my pics, not sure how many people want to see more post op pics, they all look about the same. Another thing, I'm starting to see why Armani patients (from what I've read on here) don't want to post here. Are people always this hostile to new members?

Oh, I fogot to add.. I did question Dr Armani himself about the survival rates of his large FUE cases. He told me they are averaging between 90% and 95% survival rates. I'll let you know in about 8 to 10 months how accurate that is. :-)

No, not associated with AdamAlvi or Alvi Armani. Although, I probably could have saved a lot of money on my procedure if I had been. lol. Yeah, I know the pics that I was given weren't all of the best quality, as it appears that those guys are taking their own photos at home. I too wonder why some people take photos in lighting that is not only less than desirable, but often makes it impossible to see anything. The pics of the one guy who posted his results at quest4hair.blogspot are the ones that really helped me make my final decision. His pics are pretty clear for having taken them himself. I knew from the dozens upon dozens of cases I had already seen from Armani's Strip cases that he is one of the most artistic surgeons when it comes to placement, and that doesn't change regardless if he does FUE or Strip, placement is done the same. The question comes down to survivability of the FUE grafts compared to Strip grafts. I didn't have a huge amount of FUE pics to go on to make my decision, but I knew I would not ever be happy with a Strip scar as I keep my hair way to short. Also, if for some reason in the future I indeed have more progression and decide I don't want to chase my hair anymore, I can still shave my hair with no visible scarring. Based on what I had read about Armani over-quoting graft count, I was very worried about the 4000 grafts that Armani said I needed, because it sounded excessive to me. So I had consults with two other docs prior to moving forward, and both of them suggested a very similar amount in my case (Hasson & Wong suggested 3800). That kind of put my mind at ease as far as the graft count. I'm planning on taking some "good" photos once I get to 3 and 4 months post-op. I don't have a super expensive camera or anything, but hopefully I can get good enough shots to help someone else out with their decision. Hopefully my results turn out well..

This guy has his own website, had some previous work but ended up doing 3K FUE with Armani over a year ago. http://www.hairlosshelp.com/websites/galleryview.cfm?id=gac201|gallery1.cfm This guy had 2500 FUE and is an Armani Rep. Pics are kind of dark, but I think he says he will email bigger pics upon request. http://fue2500.blogspot.com/ This kid had 2500 FUE performed. I post a few of his pics in the post above, but this is his full website with several pics. http://quest4hair.blogspot.com/ I think I knew of some other Armani FUE pic websites and will post them here if I can find them.

Another..

Here's another..

Hey guys, I'm new here, but have been researching these sites for over a year and a half. I decided to join and post after reading this thread. I'm not sure why Armani's people don't post their FUE pics for everyone to see. While I was researching with them they supplied me several examples of grown out FUE results. I will post the ones I have below so you guys can see them. After a year and a half of research, I decided to go with Armani for my HT and had it done early last month. I received 4,181 grafts via FUE in Beverly Hills, and it took about 13 hours. (Those hours sucked too, but it's kind of like child birth I think, after a few days you forget how bad it was) 4000 sounded like a lot to me to after the initial consultation, so I did consultations with Hasson $ Wong as well, and they recommended 3800. I did have a little bit of shockloss in the recipient area; I would estimate around 10%, but nothing too bad. The donor area healed quite well and was almost impossible to see after 2 weeks. I returned to work 3 weeks after surgery and no one has noticed anything. Once I came back, I began using a little bit of cover up makeup to hide the obvious new hairline that the residual redness left. Everyone assumed that I had gotten a little bit of a sunburn on my LA "vacation". I only felt comfortable going through with the operation because of my response to meds, and even then, it took a lot of research to be sure. I have been on meds for 3 years solid now and have been an excellent responder, especially to rogaine. My mom and coworkers began asking me what I was doing to my hair after 2 1/2 weeks of use of rogaine. Within 3 or 4 months, my hair had almost tripled in thickness, and my hairline moved back down closer to it's originaly location. I have even noticed new hairs popping up in my hairline as recently as the last few months. If it hadn't been for this good response, I don't think I would have gone through with the procedure. Anyways, here are some of the pics I was sent prior to my procedure: