imissthebarber

Dr Lindsey thanks for your informative input. Can't decide - It is worthwhile for you to look at lots of before and after pics and honestly try to imagine if you would be happy with the results you are seeing. If you can find guys of similar age and characteristics to you that will obviously give you a better guideline. Just because someone was or was not pleased with their results may not effect whether you would or would not be pleased with certain results. Having said that it is worth remembering the point Balody was making: People often want more and you may find yourself in that situation in 18 months if you go ahead with the surgery. As other people have said don't rush into it.

Thanks everyone for the comments. Eman what you said makes sense. I think inviting people to take a closer look is a good idea but I am still building up the confidence to do that. This is partly because shock loss in the donor area is still somewhat of an issue although it is definitely improving now. Ringo - young De Niro definitely! I think I'd find it easier if people did ask 'does it grow?'. People I know don't tend to come out and ask what they are thinking, maybe it is an English thing.

Nearly 4 months post op my HT is starting to grow in. I was NW5 so I guess it is pretty noticeable. Some people I know have started to notice and I've overheard some people telling others it is a hair system. THANKS very much, don't worry about checking the facts! I haven't told many people about the HT partly because most people on here seem to think it is better not to say anything if you can avoid it. So anyway, I'm wondering whether to <UL TYPE=SQUARE> <LI> tell people it's a HT <LI> just tell them it isn't a system <LI> try to let them see over time that it is growing <LI> just ignore it. Anyone else had experiences along these lines? What did you do? Any experiences or advice appreciated.

Balody I've got to agree I certainly laughed out loud on that story. Thanks for sharing.

If you look around on the site there's quite a few discussions about the width of the scar. I don't think going to a top doc is a 100% guarantee of a thin scar as it also depends on aspects of your physiology.

Short Answer: Yes. Slightly Longer Answer: They work in different ways which a lot of people believe can be symbiotic. The process by which minoxidil works is not very well understood, it is applied to the affected region/s of the scalp. Finasteride is taken as a pill and inhibits the DHT type of testosterone to which certain hairs on the male scalp can become susceptible. So they work in different ways and can be complimentary. However, if you start taking them both together and only one works you won't necessarily know which one is working and which one isn't.

Acrobaz - thanks for the link this was a pretty informative article with a useful associated video.

I agree that from what has been posted on the internet and research currently underway this could well be true. However, all sensible planning should not rely on future possibilities which might not materialise when you want. Also any new treatment e.g. hair cloning may well be very expensive to begin with. Even if it does come in it may well take a while for prices to reach more affordable levels.

I'm sure dalew will reply to you GTDL but it seems to me from his story it is pretty obvious that something you are not happy with now could be something you would accept in the future especially when you get to an age where more and more of people your age are in the same boat. Anyway, best of luck with whatever you decide to do. Like dalew said do your homework and think about the future.

Depending on how much hair loss you have, I think it is generally agreed that FUE does not allow you to get as many FU's from the donor area.

In some ways this seems like good news but in other ways it isn't massively reassuring...

Thanks, I understand what Bill is saying. My question is a bit more specific. Given that it is not possible to achieve full density across the scalp, my question assumes someone wants to fill in the front and top and wants a natural long term look. This could involve accepting the crown will be very thin or non-existent. In this case do people plan to leave hair in reserve so they don't end up with an island on top? (This can happen naturally but IMO is not normally as big or uniformly shaped as many HT's.)

For people who have had a HT to the front and top region, what plans do you have about what to do if, or perhaps when, the sides recede lower towards the ears? Has anyone filled in this area while there is still a lot of native hair so that it will never be obvious it is going? For people who haven't done this how have you styled your hair at this stage? Are you keeping donors in reserve for this and if so how many? Even if you think propecia works fine for you surely it is wise to plan in case it stops being effective. A lot of guys have reported this can happen.

I believe nanogen is similar to toppik and I didn't find nanogen too useful in the recipient area as there were not enough hairs for it to cling on to and it mostly ended up resting on my scalp and looking kind of funny. But as Bill said the cost of either product is minimal so experiment and see what works for you.

Very amusing! Also it does highlight the fact that taking the staples out is over reasonably quickly and the pain often is not as bad as expected.

I feel for you dude and I can hear what you are saying about the worst part being before not after. However, if you do get advice from high quality docs that you can go ahead don't expect it to be a picnic afterwards. Before a HT people might not realise Hair loss bothers you, projecting confidence is important (not easy though I admit). Once you have had something done there is more of a risk that your personal struggle with this comes out into the public arena. A lot of the time I feel that my post op hair is none of other people's business but I can understand why they are interested in the change to my appearance as it may seem strange and surprising to them and so they become curious.

This might be stating the obvious, but if the scar ever starts to show that is really bad news. It means hairs from that region are not MPB resistant so transplanted hairs from that area would also fall out. Depending on how the hairs were mixed and matched when they were put in to the recipient area, this could result in really weird hair loss patterns in the recipient zone. Could it be possible that Dr. Humayun and Rassman disagree over where a NW6 ends and a NW7 starts? I agree with this. Some people are NW7 by age 30 so there's a portion of your 7% straight off then there is all the NW6 and NW5's at 30 as well who must be more likely to reach NW7.

As far as I understand: 1. The front gives the biggest cosmetic impact so the surgeon would likely put some hairs in this region unless the loss is solely in the crown. However, a lot of factors come into play such as the NW level, age, donor availability etc. Basically all the usual stuff discussed here. Given limited donor availability many people would steer clear of doing the crown. Once you commit to the small crown I can't see how you avoid being committed to the enlarged crown if you suffer further hair loss. This can take a huge number of grafts for much less cosmetic impact than with the front. I guess you could in theory do the enlarged crown but not the small crown but in practice I'm not sure that you could ever be sure it had expanded as far as it ever will. Also I'm not sure that many guys would want that kind of look. People might instead go for thin but even coverage in that whole area. 2. A lot of surgeons use single hairs at the hairline but other than that I don't think it depends to much on the regions. 3. Needle size correlates with the FU size. I think you are basically asking a similar question to 2, smaller FU's will require smaller needles.

Looking good dude. Keep the updates coming, I'm a couple of months behind you.

3.5 months post op I met up with some people I haven't seen for over a year. I could tell they couldn't figure out what had happened and were talking about it to each other but no one said anything directly. Some other people there must have heard them talking because all these people I didn't know were giving me grief for wearing a hairpiece. I did feel a slight sense of smugness that they didn't know the truth but, mainly felt pretty lousy about it. Anyone else had experiences like this? I think the people I already knew were not all convinced it was a hairpiece but maybe did not know what to think or say. (I guess some good news is that the HT must be working to get this reaction.)

There's plenty of guys who would disagree with that statement. However, it all comes down to expectations. If you expect to look like you did when you were 18 then you probably don't have enough donor hair. However, if you expect to make a significant cosmetic difference to your appearance then that is possible with normal amounts of donor hair. In this scenario someone might perhaps expect some thinning in the crown and would probably want to leave some hair in reserve for possible future loss. They would also look into meds.

This is a common question. The key things are: <UL TYPE=SQUARE> <LI> Don't be to be too aggresive in wanting a low hairline <LI> leave enough in reserve in case the sides recede towards the ears and if you are a lower NW number now, take into account possible future hair loss on the top <LI> Don't put too many grafts in the crown as a previous poster said there is only limited supply. <LI> Don't rely on future discoveries - if they come along great but we can never predict what science can and can't acheive. <LI> Most people start with more density at the front tapering down as they go further back.

In this useful post that mmhce alerted me to, it states that the half-life for propecia is 6-8 hours. Avodart details Based on this and the chart Spex posted wouldn't it be more sensible to take propecia 0.5mg twice a day rather than 1mg once a day?

mmhce - thanks for the useful links. In a nutshell it seems Dutasteride does inhibit DHT more effectively than propecia but; it has a greater propensity to cause side effects, and is not currently FDA approved as a hair loss treatment. Does anyone know if it is approved as a treatment for hair loss in other countries? Also I'm still interested if anyone has got any personal experiences of propecia causing hair rejuvenation in one part of the scalp but still losing hair in another area.

Thanks Bill I think I read somewhere that either Dutasteride or Avodart inhibit both types of the enzyme. Does this mean that they are more effective? Excluding minoxidil which works in a different way, propecia still seems to be the most common med so I'm guessing the others may have some drawbacks?