Al - Moderator

No John. I'm in the same boat as you. I got a really bad HT and I keep hearing people tell me how it's my fault for not researching or that I shouldn't have gotten a HT. These are supposed to be Drs. The law requires that they tell you the truth of your situation and what can or can't be done. How can anyone put the responsibilty on the patient to know more than the Dr? That doesn't make sense. I would have to go to 6 years of medical school and be practicing in the field of HTs for X amount of years to know what the Dr knows. You can't ever blame the patient for not knowing more than the Dr., yet too many people seem to want to do that. Besides even if the patient feels the Dr may be wrong about a particular aspect is the patient supposed to refuse the Drs advice and insist on doing an operation the way the patient thinks is best? If that happened and it didn't turn out right then the same people would still be blaming the patient for not listening to the Dr. It can't go both ways. The Dr is the one to blame. Unfortunately nothing happens to them. They just keep going about their business while we are left in misery for years. As for research. When someone gets a toothache does anyone expect them to spend 6 months to a year researching various dentists to see which one can do a root canal or pull a tooth? No, of course not! So why should I be expected to research for that long for a procedure which is supposedly just like going to the dentist (or so it's advertised as).

I'll add something to this: One clinic may have an approach of doing higher hairlines to get more density in a smaller area while another clinic may opt for slightly lower hairlines in more cases. The higher hairlines will sometimes look better because with the same amount of grafts you can get more density giving the appearance of thicker hair while the lower hairline may look worse because what you see is thinner hair in the entire area. Sometime eyes can play tricks on us and part of the artistic ability is knowing how to get that right. That doesn't mean that the clinic that usually does higher hairlines is more skilled at HTs. It may simply mean that the Dr is better at convincing patients to go for a higher hairline.

This is not always true. In fact it's probably usually not true if your first HT is when you are a stage 3 and you don't get any more. If you get the front dense packed and then a few years later you lose a lot more hair, your HT will not still cover the front and be "stand alone" like some people here will lead you to believe. Most likely the area of loss will widen leaving you with a large tuft of dense packed HT hair with 1 or 2 or more centimeters of bald scalp on each side between the side hair above your ears and the transplanted hair on top. This depends on the person and how fast you continue losing your hair. I disagree with thanatopsis_awry who feels you "should pretty much go into getting HTs w/ high confidence that you will be able to suitably confront your MPB". I guess it depends on what he means by "suitable confront". I think if you're destined to be a NW 7 or even a 6 in many cases then you most likely won't end up satisfied unless you drastically reduce your expectations of getting decent coverage over the entire area AND be willing to spend double or triple the amount of money you are being quoted for. In other words you have to be willing to be a NW 3 with a high hairline after spending $30000. If you're not destined to be a NW 6 or 7 then this may not apply, but I feel you were asking about possible problems in the future if you start a HT now. Unfortunately if you continue to lose hair at a fast rate you really can't "call it quits" until you run out of donor hair. I started my HT as a NW 5 and tried to play catch up with my hairloss until I ran out of donor. The bald area widened by several centimeters on each side and 6 centimeters down the back.

I know plenty of people who tell me I was dumb or stupid to get a HT. When you get a good one they think you did a smart thing. When you get an obvious bad one they wonder why you would ever do such a thing.

Certain coalition Drs on here insist that a HT is a cure for baldness (and if they really feel that way then I question why they are in the coalition). I'm glad you went to one who has a bit more sense and told you the truth. however I do wonder what you would have been told if you were still at stage 3 hairloss which we all know you were at some point earlier in time. would they have recommended a mega-session of 4000 to 5000 grafts? If so, what would happen when 5 years later you end up at what would have been stage 7?

My HT was done many years ago, but I was guaranteed the following: 1. The transplanted hair would be the same density as the hair system I was wearing. 2. I'd be able to part it through the center with no noticeable thinness showing in the part. 3. I would have more hair than I had when I was 18. 4. There would be no scars. Not just no noticeable scars, but no scars at all. Scars are not even mentioned in the form I signed. 5. Not only would I get all that hair on top, but they would double the amount of hair in the donor area since I was concerned about thinning sides and back. I paid $150 per HT session for the guarantee of no scars and thicker donor area. The $150 was handwritten by them on their billing after each HT session as a separate charge, so they most certainly knew about it.

Some of the possible side effects of taking minoxidil are dizziness or light-headedness, rapid heart beat, chest pains, and other similar effects. I got all of those really bad when I tried taking minoxidil and had to stop. It took me a while to realize it was the minoxidil causing it because the symptoms happened about 45 minutes after applying it all the time. Also, the side effects can be worse if the minoxidil gets into your blood stream more than would normally from topical application. In other words if you have a cut on your head and apply minox to that area, the side effects can be worse than normal. So that may be a possible reason for it to only happen now. I would stop the minoxidil. Propecia should probably be OK.

charlieb, I agree with you. I bought my laser comb for about $120 and have been using it for 15 months now. That's a cost of $8 per month and the per month cost keeps going down as time goes by. It's now the cheapest thing I've tried for hair growth and I've tried a bunch of things over the last 25 years. Most of them never worked. The laser comb does. If it didn't work on me I certainly wouldn't still be using it. I wonder about the Drs who say they tried LLLT on some patients. I'd like to know how long they tried it for and how often. If you only use LLLT for 2 or 3 days each week for a few months, then don't expect to see any big improvements. I use my laser comb every day for 15 months. When a Dr can say they had patients who tried it daily for a year and they still aren't convinced then I'll listen to that to some extent. Otherwise it doesn't mean anything. That's like saying you let 20 people use minoxidil twice a week for 3 months and they didn't grow hair. Well of course they didn't. You also can't compare it to a HT which it sounds like some people keep trying to do. If you compare it to minoxidil and propecia and think of it as an ongoing daily treatment then I think it compares very well. It may be a little less effective than either of those, but it does work on some people and there are no side effects.

I'm not 100% sure on this. I thought the single laser with mirrors was what they originally sold in Australia some years ago. They submitted a 9 laser model for FDA clearance. Again I could be wrong, but I think that's what I remember reading. I don't have time to find it now.

The premium model is the one cleared by the FDA. The SE model is a cheaper model that was being sold prior to that. Hairmax has since stopped selling the SE model in the USA because of the FDA objections to it not being the one they cleared. The 2 models were renamed to what they are now some time after the FDA clearance.

LOL. and we hope that she is unethical with her patients. After that I think we should take a trip to Istanbul to continue the discussion with Dr. Melike Paeffgen

So you're saying all of the HT consultants such as Jotronic, Spex and others are unethical . They get paid by the HT Dr, so they can't have an objective view on anything about hairloss, so they must be unethical. Right? And wouldn't that have to include ALL hair transplant Drs who post pictures here? Wouldn't they all be unethical because they can't be objective? If you feel that way about one Dr shouldn't you feel the same about all of them? If not then please explain the difference.

I am unable to view the pictures. I think the % in the titles is causing problems. Try renaming them without the % in the names.

The female who started the thread says her friend is bald and sexy and then askes others what they think. In her next post the same girl says another guy she knows wears a hairpiece and says "the guy with the toupee is not a bad looking guy. He'd probably look just fine without the rug." Read that again. She's saying she's not sure if he would look better without a rug or with it. In her next post she says "my husband used to have hair down to his arse. headbanger stage." So while she says bald is sexy she decided to be with someone who had a lot of hair. and her next post she says an "odd head shape with the bulge at the base of the neck gives me the willies.". So she has now moved completely to the other side saying some bald heads are ugly. My opinion is when a women says bald men are sexy they almost always have some celebrity in mind. They don't think he's sexy because he is bald, but rather it's the money, body, celebrity status, etc. I bet they would think the guy in mind is even more sexy if he had hair.

Dr Feller, I have to apologize on that one. I don't always respond to everything on these boards. I did see your offer and I am seriously considering making an appointment to visit you in NY. I'm very hesitant about going through another HT after 25 prior ones. I finally got my life back together after many years of wanting to kill myself over the horrible experience and really don't want to take a risk of going back to that. The non response to a consultation with you was nothing against you.

PGP, I already did that. That's why I believe in LLLT. I don't use minoxidil because of bad reactions. I used proscar cut in quarters for 11 years. I wanted to stop or reduce my use of Proscar, but every time I did I started getting increased hairloss. Once I started using a laser comb I was finally able to reduce my proscar intake to about a quarter pill every 3 or 4 days. I don't even really keep track anymore. I just take a piece every few days. Sometimes I go a week without it. I've had what I thought was permanent shock loss from many HTs back in the 80s and 90s. In those 11 years of proscar use none of the shock loss areas ever grew any hair. Hair started growing in those areas once I started using a laser comb. I wish I took before pictures of 2 specific areas of shock loss, but I didn't expect those areas to grow (hoped for it, but didn't expect it). I thought those would be the hold out areas that wouldn't get growth. It turned out to be the opposite. I get the best growth in the areas where I had shock loss. This is why I've stated before that I can't really show pictues with much noticeable improvement. I can't show pictures of me not taking proscar and I don't have specific Before photos of the shock areas.

Please tell me what the difference is when Drs (and almost everyone on these boards) recommend minoxidil or propecia. Its always stated that potential HT patients should try using propecia for 6 months to a year to see if it works for you. Just about every HT Dr out there says that, yet we don't see Drs posting photos of hair growth. They only post photos of their HTs. This again is the same as minoxidil and propecia. When they first came out they were supposed to grow a moderate amount of hair in at least 80% of patients. Both of them over the years are now down to hopefully you will be able to maintain what you have for a few years. There's even talk now that any positive effects wear off after 3 or 4 years. That means after years of using them you'll most likely have no benefit, yet all HT Drs keep telling everyone to use them. I think I've heard of 2 people who have grown enough hair to decide they didn't need a HT yet. I know Janna (think it was Janna) posted a picture of amazing growth with minoxidil, but I believe it was later acknowledged that the person was also using other things and there may have even been a concealer involved. So again, what's the difference between those and lasers?

If you're not interested in HT anymore then why not put the removed grafts into the scar that you want to fix? Why throw them out when you can use them for that?

Well mine is just so obvious that pretty much anyone who meets me knows I've had one. You guys are lucky if you can get away without anyone noticing.

I want to respond to some other things. HAIR GROWTH: I never said I am growing all my hair back. Believe me I wish I was!! I stated that I've had some improvements here and there. I'm hoping to get at least enough so that I can maybe get 1500 grafts in a future HT to make me not look so freakish. That is very far from miraculous growth from a laser comb as Dr Feller seems to think I'm saying. AGENDA: What possible agenda do I have? I don't tell people to go buy a laser comb. I even agree that it's a rip-off for Drs to charge $1000s for LLLT treatments when you can do it yourself from home at $200 or less for a year or more. I don't work for or have any affiliations with any laser comb company. My only agenda is to try to find something that will grow some hair on my head. This is the same reason most others are here. The only difference is I'm past the point of being maxed out of donor hair, so I have to try other remedies. Otherwise I would be getting another HT just like the rest of you. If I was going to have some evil agenda it would be telling everyone how HTs don't work. If you know my story you'd understand that. However I don't do that. PROOF: I keep reading that I need to show proof that it's working. Well I'm sorry, but there's no way anyone can ever take a photo of hair not falling out! It just can't be done. I used Proscar for over 10 years and I can't show before and after photos where you would see massive hair growth either, but the fact that you can't really tell a difference in 10 years means to me that it worked as far as keeping what hair i had all those years. If that's acceptable for Proscar and minoxidil then why isn't it acceptable for a laser comb? Using the comb, I've been able to significantly reduce my use of proscar which is what I was hoping to do because of increased side effects as I get older and after many years of being on it. So for me that is part of the success. But again, I can't show you a photo of those things. Nobody can. TO DR FELLER: I am not fake. I don't know why you hate me so much and want me banned. If anything I should be the one hating HT Drs. Believe me, if I could have a successful HT I would. Please if you've never done so, please take a look at thye pictures at this link and maybe you'll understand my predicament a little more. Believe me, this is real. I am really living through this for the past 20+ years. I wish it was all make believe, but it isn't. I don't appreciate you saying I'm a phony. http://members.aol.com/LongScars/photos.html

Why would any Recommended or Coalition Dr post here in favor of LLLT when 90% of the members have already determined that any Dr that does post in favor of it is an unethical scum bag even if they aren't offering LLLT themselves or offering it for free to make their own conclusions before charging money. Wasn't Rassman doing that? How can you ever get input on whether or not something works if you first state that anyone offering a certain opinion is not welcome here and if they are a Dr they should lose their recommended/coaltion status? By doing that you eliminated any way of actually finding out if there's any credibility to it. You can't then logically conclude that because these people would rather not risk being banned, tarred and feathered, etc. that it means there is nobody in favor of it. Doesn't anyone understand this besides me??? Forget about my own opinion of LLLT for a minute. If you read all of my posts, I never said anyone should buy a laser comb. What I said is that if you already have one because you got it as a gift or alreday bought one then why not use it for a few months and then post the results here. What harm can that possible do? Isn't that what we should all want to happen? don't we want to find out the results from members who are using it? There have been several people who said they were using it and would report back and never did. Can't you see why they don't? How can you ever get anyone to post their experience with it if you tell them they are idiots for trying it in the first place!?? You people have no common sense!

glajo, This is weird because I JUST posted in another thread about how a laser comb is working great for getting hair to grow in my shock loss areas. I had shock loss from several HTs many years ago. I had a few scattered hairs growing like you say. Had that in several shocked areas. I went about 15 years with the shock loss, so there was no way it was ever coming back on its own. I started using a laser comb last year and I now have a decent amount of growth in those areas. It's not totally full yet, but it's still improving and there's enough around the lower donor scar area to get some coverage.

I tried to stay away from this argument for a while because too many people are against me and some of them are very vocal. I've been using a laser comb for over a year and I'm still using it. If I didn't think it worked I would have stopped using it long ago. As for the cost, I don't understand why people are saying it's so expensive. I spent about $120 total and I've been using it almost 14 months. That's less than $9 per month. What treatments are you using that cost less than that? And unless my laser comb stops working tomorrow, the average monthly cost will keep decreasing. There's no further costs involved unless you count the few pennies spent on the electricity used. I can say it absolutely, positively, no doubt about it, works for growing hair in areas of "permanent" shock loss. I had about a 1 inch square section on my lower left donor area that had almost no hair growing at all for the past maybe 15 years around a donor scar and another area in my crown that was bare from shock loss after removing previously transplanted hair to redistribute it. After a few months of using the laser comb on both areas, new hair started to grow. It's still improving and the areaa are both almost completely filled. Both spots were empty of hair for nearly 15 years, so there's no way anyone can ever tell me it's not because of the laser comb.

Unfortunately the link on my page I had to that news story is no longer valid. Dr. Hitzig used people were not Drs. to perform surgeries and pretend to be Drs. What Hitzig used to do is hire some former patients to be reps or showcase patients. They weren't necessarily former patients of his. At least one was a former patient from another HT company. A couple of them he eventually started using as part time techs. The allegations are that some of those people also began performing all aspects of the HT including consultation and the actual surgeries on some patients. The patients were led to believe those former patients were actually the Drs. That is what I've heard and read. Parts of it I know are true, but I don't have first hand knowledge of all of it. They are (were) a mini HT chain with about 5 locations in NY, NJ, and PA, so what was happening in one location wasn't necessarily happening in all others. ----- Here's what I can assure you is true because this is what happened to me: A supposedly former patient named Lou Amico would go around showing off his great results. He spoke to me showing me how the crown was a little thinner than the front. I didn't find out until years later that he actually had his HT by another company and NOT by L. I. Medical, yet they used him constantly as a great success story and his before and after photos were in their brochures. The brochures and info tell you that you "At L.I. Medical Associates, all physicians are licensed to practice medicine and surgery and have specialized training in hair transplant techniques." "You will always be treated as a patient seeking professional medical advice and service." "At the consultation, one of our physicians will evaluate the type and severity of baldness" Those statements that I just quoted from their information booklet is what made me go there because I had already been to a dermatologist who handled general skin problems, so I decided to seek a specialist in hair and scalp conditions. I made an appointment and had a consultation with the "Executive Medical Director" named Stephen Archibald who said I needed surgery as soon as possible because if I waited much longer my condition would be too advanced to be able to stop and reverse it. I as already a NW 5/6 at age 22, so I had the HT done by him. I didn't find out until 5 years later that he was not a Dr. The company knew he wasn't and yet he had been working there for 13 years prior to my first visit. They listed the Dr. of that office as Dr. James J Malecka, yet Stephen had the title of Executive Medical Director. I hardly ever saw Dr. Malecka. He had his own General Practice about a half hour away. He would just show up at the office, ask how I was, then leave the building a few minutes later. Dr. Malecka never actually spoke to me about any of the procedures. When someone called and asked to speak to the Dr. they would hand the phone to Stephen Archibald. This happened to me when I called, when my mother called concerned about the procedures, and I saw and heard it happen when I was in the office when others called in. After several sessions that I felt were total failures I did have a consultation with Dr. Hitzig who agreed to perform the next HT session on me himself since he was supposed to be one of the best. When I went in to have it done, Hitzig was there and I was prepped for surgery. Then as it was about to begin, he told me another Dr would be doing the work. I was concerned about that, but Hitzig told me that Dr. John P Schwinning was actually better than himself at HTs and I would be better off letting Dr. Schwinning do it. Hitzig said he already discussed everything with Dr. Schwinning that we had agreed on in the earlier consultation. This was the first time I met Dr. Schwinning or had even heard of him and I was already in the chair with the bandage on my head and being sedated. It turned out that he actually was a Dr., but he was banned from practicing surgery except for elective Hair Transplants because of malpractice issues. He had previously amputated the wrong leg of a patient. After the procedure with Dr. Schwinning I went back to complain that he hadn't done what was promised and he had absolutely no idea what was agreed to by me and Hitzig. He said Hitzig told him I just moved to north New Jersey and was trying to get a little more coverage out of an old HT. He had no idea I had already been a patient of theirs, never saw my patient file, never knew I had agreed to something specific in a consultation with Dr. Hitzig. All he would say is if I had a problem with the HT then I'd have to talk to Dr. Hitzig. I told him he was crazy. Why would I talk to someone else when you're the one who performed the surgery? He couldn't answer that and just kept saying he didn't have anything to do with it. I asked him why he would perform surgery on someone without knowing or asking what surgery was supposed to be done. Again he had no answer other than to tell me to get out of his office and not to come back. That's the condensed version of my experience with them. http://members.aol.com/LongScars/index.html

WARNING: Stay far, far away from Dr Hitzig and anyone associated with him (Dr John P Schwinning, Dr James J Malecka, Dr Michael Kassouf, Dr Paul M Goldberg, etc). Take a look at what they did to me. Although it was a long time ago, from what I can tell they haven't changed much. They still say minigrafts and punch tools are better than other methods. Here's a link to what they did to me. http://members.aol.com/LongScars/index.html There are 100s of people suing them. There was a class action as well as several individual lawsuits. Hitzig and company will tell you the lawsuits were dropped because the patients had no case, but that is not true. What Hitzig does is has his lawyers delay proceedings as long as possible until lawsuits start piling up and then closes the corporation and starts a new one the same day in the same offices. What happens then is those suing have no recourse because the corporation they are suing no longer exists even though Hitzig is still practicing in the same location. It's a loophole in the laws that he and his lawyers are great at working with. He's done this several times over the years and has no problems with continuing to close the company and reopen under a new name as many times as he needs to. Here's a link to some of the class actions that were going on: http://www.injuryassist.com/LIMA_Litigation/LIMA_Litigation.htm