EpilepticSceptic

Man, really sorry to hear that!

Can you please tell us who your surgeon was ?

From my understanding (after 5 long years of research on HTs) different patients have different physiologies, and therefore what applies to patient X may not apply to patient Y.

I have heard that scalp laxity and scalp elasticity are 2 different things. Laxity is the ability of the skin to slide up/down/left/right over the skull (galia), and elasticity has to do with how much the skin can actually stretch.

Therefore, it stands to reason that a patient with very poor laxity but high elasticity might very well encounter the skin having to stretch in order to close the wound, which could possibly result in making a bald spot larger if the skin has to stretch in that area to close the gap from the strip taken out. Also, patients with high elasticity and poor laxity will have a higher chance of experiencing a stretched donor scar that is wider than normal.

These are just theories I have based upon years of research, so don't take my word for it as I am not a medical doctor/expert. I knew I had great laxity going into my strip surgery, and if it would have been the other way around I most likely would have backed out of it.

Back in 2005 on the HLH forum (before I dissapeared for 5 years from all HT forums as part of my research strategy) I predicted that in a few years alot of disgruntled Armani patients would be popping up.

Boy, was I ever right! It was really pretty easy to see why there would eventually be so many who felt that HT was a failure. He would use up 5000 grafts on a dense packed mustache in the hairline (a.k.a. "front loading the hairline") on guys in their early 20s, and for this he was worshipped as a god by many.

It didn't take a rocket scientist to see that the majority of these young guys would get a few good years in the clubs (which is exactly what they were paying for) with a NW0 hairline before they would end up becoming anti-HT repair patients who look like circus freaks. But I'm sure Armani didn't care because his bank account just keeps getting bigger just like any other unethical white collar scam artist out there.

And this was from his strip work which was actually technically very good. I had no idea that he would go all FUE and butcher so many young guys, wrecking their donors, leaving cobblestoning, and then acting like a thug mafia king who threatens anybody that dare tell the truth about his blatant lack of ethics.

The links that Sparky listed are just a very small percentage of the hacked up Armani patients out there.

Seek more and ye shall find!

Shave your head to a #1 or 2 guard and KEEP it that way for 5 or even 10 years. This way you eliminate the "bad hair day" scenario.

At this length you will be shocked at just how far your thinning has progressed, and just how much longer hair has concealed it. I tell this to all the newbies around here who have convinced themselves that they have halted MPB and that they are likely 1-2 Norwood levels worse than they think they are. Shave it down and reveal the harsh truth!

Like Sparky said keep photos at 6 month intervals.

I recently saw some photos I took at a #2 guard 11 years ago when I first started to take proscar. I was amazed to see that my crown is in better shape today than it was back then, and that my mid scalp has not progressed any further.

that's why when i see peeps in their 20s on here saying they wont take proscar for fear of sides, I think they are fools who will later come to regret that crucial mistake !

Go to Armani then, delay no further !!

If you don't have MPB then ask him to do a strip and he'll give you exactly what you want and you can live happily ever after and take a trip to Disney World.

However, if you DO have MPB, then he'll give you what you want and in 10 years time you'll look like a circus freak with a densely packed $15K mustache on the front of your head, and a hideously balding noggin behind it with 0 donor hair left to fix it.

The choice is yours; are we ready to gamble ?

I washed once a day using the special shampoo H & W provided for the first 12 days. I think it's mostly important to keep the scar area really clean because it's still somewhat of an open wound.

After 15 days if your crusts are gone I wouldn't worry too much about obsessive washing. IMO too much washing might be counterproductive, especially if it's a harsh shampoo. Look at all the homeless people who have full, thick heads of hair and take baths maybe once every 3 months! I don't really think the hair follicles need much other than blood supply at the 1 month mark to grow.

Just relax and try to be stress free because you've got a long, hard waiting period ahead! At only 2.5 months post-op for me it already feels like 2 years have gone by, and days feel like months !!!

j1j9j85,

Sucks doesn't it ? I warned you about it in an old thread of yours when i was at about the 1 month mark myself.

I had a 4496 session with big H on May 20th. Felt like I was flying on a magic carpet til around day 16 post-op when the dreaded shed occured. It was especially depressing for me because the grafts were growing already and I was looking damn good!

At the end of month one it was the lowest of the low that I have ever experienced with my appearence, mostly because of the shockloss to my thin forelock that at least helped me pull off the "illusion" of hair and facial framing in the past. To look in the mirror at this stage can be extremely depressing -- so just DON'T DO IT !!

Month 2 brought alot of optimistic feelings with it because definite growth could be seen. Now I'm at the 2.5 month mark and things seem to be getting better daily and I am almost at the point where I can ditch the hat and at least look close to like I did pre-op. REALLY looking forward to month 3 and beyond !!!!

Been taking 3000mg MSM daily since month one. Also been applying 5% minox daily since month one, though I swore I'd never use that crap again. But ANYTHING that would hopefully speed up the process suddenly became a BIG priority after seeing what I looked like at the end of month one -- that is indeed a look I will never forget, and hopefully never have to see again until I am in my 60s/70s/80s !!!!

Hang in there bro, it will definitely get better as it cannot get any worse then where you are now !!! Just hold your chin up and think positive thoughts, meditate on your hair coming in and leaving baldness behind you. Negative thoughts can only make you feel like crap and do not help the situation!

Makes me think of that old Doors song: "I been down so goddamn long, that it looks like up to me"

RE001,

No offense taken bro -- I just speak the truth.

BTW you won the battle maybe for now, but not the war. MPB will NOT quit and with the level of crown loss you have now the odds are ptretty high you'll end up at least a NW5+/6 by age 40.

If you want to see what you'll look like as a NW5/6/7 it's pretty simple: just shave the top down to bald skin and leave the monk fringe intact. If you can "live with" that look then you are truly home free! Make sure to go out and see how other people/women react to it as well.

My father use to tell me that the mind of a man changes every 5-10 years. Now that I'm 41 I can truly see the wisdom in his statement. That's why if I were you I'd do the shave thing mentioned above and see how you feel about that look. This way you don't have to wait until you're 35/40 to see how you will react about it.

RE001,

Good for you man! Enjoy the few years that you have left with that stubble on top before it's all gone and you are a NW6/7. Without finasteride it's pretty much a guaruntee you'll be there shortly considering where you are now; but as you are no longer concerned about your hairloss you need not worry about any of this stuff anymore. You are FREE !

I'm in the entertainment biz, and I am strongly against a clinic using my photos in any way.

And I still don't see the incentive most patients have for sending photos to the clinic if they have great outcomes. Most guys are worried about people finding out and thinking that they are vain, or they'd really just rather forget about the whole thing alltogether; plus, the downtime and waiting period is so hard that when the hair finally grows in you just want to move on with your life and hopefully not have to spend any more time on HT forums for many years!

IMO these forums are a like a bad Kafka novel with people wasting alot of precious time obsessing over their hair; there are some on here that seem like emotional basket cases who should seek out counseling because they will never be happy no matter how good their hair/scar looks -- they are alot like bolemic women who will never be skinny enough until they look like Auschwitz victims. There are probably liposuction forums out there for women who want to get rid of cellulite, and there are probably obsessive/compulsive women who spend 10 hours every day hanging out on these forums and who will never be satisfied because enough fat couldn't be sucked out of their thighs to look as good as Angelina Jolie. Again, another example of a bad Kafka novel!

I still contend that the MAJORITY of patients with successful outcomes do not want their pictures shown, do not bother keeping up blogs, and are too busy enjoying life and not thinking about their hair anymore. These are the average joe types who were smart/lucky enough to find a top doc, who were good candidates, and who are psycholgically healthy and have more going on in life than just their looks to constantly obsess over.

In 6-8 months time I hope (expect) to be in this category. Once I see that enough has grown in to the point where I know I am getting optimum yield it will be my greatest pleasure to dissapear into thin air from these forums and never look back -- and I think a vast majority of the patients with good outcomes share this sentiment.

Yeah, I'll keep a blog and show finished results to give back to the community that has given much to me and helped prevent me from being scammed & butchered. But remember from my previous post, I'm in the minority category #2 for pre-HT patients: the obsessive, compulsive, non-trusting research FREAK!

I agree with Raphael 110%. In today's internet world with sites like HTN the top docs' reps are on the line at all times. If they were not batting a very high average of successful outcomes then there would be many more disgruntled patients posting about their bad experiences. When you consider how many surgeries some of these docs are doing each year, and then consider how few come on here to express dissatisfaction, then you have a pretty good idea of the consistency of some of these top docs.

I think because Topcat is a repair patient from the days when the HT technology was still primitive he has a slanted view on this. Virgin heads today come into this with high expectations when selecting a top doc. They can be completely anonymous on forums like this one, not having to show their face or reveal their identity. So what shame do they have to fear ? IMO they have every incentive to post about their bad experiences if their expectations are not met and they feel the doc mislead them.

On the other hand, I think there are MANY lurkers who use sites like this to do the research but then never bother to post their great results. Then you have that category of patients who simply don't bother to do a great deal of research but are referred by friends/aquaintences who went to a top doc and had the surgery. I think these patients make up a large percentage of the top docs' customer base as well, and they never even bother taking photos or participating on internet forums.

I think the people who spend alot of time on forums like this one fall into 4 categories:

1) Repair patients who didn't do their research before and were unlucky enough to end up butchered by a sub-par doc, and/or those rare few patients who went to top docs but got subpar growth.

2) The obsessive, non-trusting type who wants to know 110% of the ins and outs of HTs BEFORE they go under the knife (I am in this category)

3) The dreamers who are either too young, don't have the $, and/or may very well never be good candidates for the surgery. They spend alot of time on forums even though they haven't yet been evaluated in person by a top doc to even know if they are a good candidate, likely because the extra cost of flying out to meet the doc just for a consultation really bothers them -- which means they probably don't have the money for the surgery anyway, and are therefore not really serious!

4) Reps, shills, site owners, etc. who have a $ interest!

I think the happy patients who bother to post detailed blogs of their experience represent a very small percentage of the successful outcomes from the top docs. The ones who don't post really have very little incentive to ever come back here and waste any more of their time; if you don't work in the HT industry or make money running a HT website then incentive to spend any time here is very small once you have had a great result. But if you are an unhappy patient or a repair patient, then you have much more incentive to spend time here. I think that probably 90% of the success stories just move on and never look back, and I really can't blame them!

TTP,

I'm hoping for alot more too, but it seems that the best way to fight MPB will continue to be a multi-part strategy for some time to come. If concealers advanced even further from where they are now, especially in terms of naturalness, then it's just one more tool in the arsenal.

I personally think that Histogen is the next big thing on the horizon. They have already confirmed that these injections work positively on 85% of the test subjects, and this was just from a safety based trial where relatively weak doses were administered. It will truly be interesting to see what kind of results they achieve in the next trial where more powerful doses are injected to see what the optimum dosage is.

Imagine if in 5 years time you can go into a clinic that will inject this stuff into your scalp in between your transplanted hair and the density is dramatically increased. This would pretty much solve the problem for patients who don't have off the charts donor density or shaft thickness.

I sure hope their target date of 2013 in Asia still pans out. I think I'll be one of the first to hop on a plane and check it out!

I've only used Toppik a couple of times. Dr. Alexander have me two color samples and I agree that it does have a very positive impact on the appearance of density but I just don't like using it.

 

Honestly, when I daydream about future innovations in the coming decade I'm hoping for much more than a revolutionary concealer. That said, if HM in some form doesn't become a reality in that time frame, I'll take a better concealer.

I know some swear by concealers and others curse them. But for me I was pretty impressed with what just a little Toppik could do with my pre-HT hair. Where I had hair it was able to thicken it up in a way that made it look alot fuller without coming off as unnatural. The secret, of course, was to have thinning hair in adequate enough density to really pull it off. I think this product is even a good way for a person without MPB, but who just has naturally fine hair, to thicken it up and make it look coarser and denser.

This got me to thinking about HTs today and how many top surgeons claim that hair shaft diameter is the single most important factor determining whether results will be home runs, or just average. For those of us without coarse or meduim coarse hair caliber, we are faced with the dilemma of not being able to cover as much bald scalp on a 1 to 1 ratio with coarser hair. So 5000 coarse hairs could very likely = 10,000 medium fine hairs as far as overall coverage.

So this all got me thinking that there is still a relatively large market for improved concealers that do an even better job of looking natural and dramatically increasing perceived hair volume. And this market is still wide open for entirely new products/approaches to attaching fibers to the hair shafts as they are growing and making them artificially thicker, but without harming the follicles.

Does anyone know of anything coming down the pipeline ? Will products like Toppik, Dermatch, and Nanogen only get better and superior to the current versions ? Or have they reached a plateau already ?

13 days here!

Skin was already beginning to grow over the staples, which made removal more painful.

Everyone's healing traits are different.

D,

I think it's absurd to expect any business to not advertise the most positive outcomes of their service. I also think you are unfairly accusing one of the best and most ethical clinics of "deceptive advertising." You obviously have not visited H & W for an in person consultation. If you did then you wouldn't be making these accusations! They would tell you honestly and straight-up what you could expect based on your characterisitics, and they would not decieve you!

I think you need to ask why is it that H & W is one of the very few clinics that even has outstanding looking results posted (in CLEAR detail) on formerly advanced NW patients ? Why is it that they are the only clinic that has a HD video section accompanying every result they post, with combs parting the hair section by section, as well as running thru the scar in the rear ? Could it be because they are so far ahead of all the other clinics when it comes to outstanding results ?

Rest assured that if ANY of the other clinics had as many outstanding results as H & W that you would see them plastered (in HUGE detail) all over the forums and on their websites. But the truth is that they just don't have the same quantity and quality of consistently great results -- period! The question you should be asking yourself as a prospective HT patient is WHY do so many of the other clinics not have very many great results to show ? And also WHY do they not have HD video in clear non-deceptive light showing the comb parting the hair all over the scalp, as well as the scar in the rear ?

As far as patients with sub-par or average results, why should any clinic be obligated to post those when you have the forum patient blogs for that ? Any really serious prospective HT patient should spend alot of time looking at these blogs. If a doctor only has a few cases from patients who do their own personal blogs, then WHY is that ?

Your point is well taken ES...However, i need to address another point in this case...We all talk about deceptive advertising from hairmills and other companies..To me those two results posted above are no less than deceptive advertising!! To make it more clear, let me explain

 

Why do clinics only post above average results that draws people into HT's...I am sure that this patient would have sent his photographs to H&W prior to posting on the forum. If the clinic in question is a truly ethical and realistic clinic, why didnt they post these pictures on the forum before the patient did? Now, i totally understand that this is a business and clinics will not post sub-par results..IMO, this is deceptive advertising as well..Here is another example to put things into perspective

 

A clinic like Hasson and Wong or Shapiro Medical group with two doctors operating would be performing atleast 4 surgeries in a week...that makes is approx. 240 surgeries a year..(this would be bare minimum) take an average of 5 years and it gives 1200 surgeries...Now, if we run a search on any of the forums, would you even see 10% of those surgeries..i know clinics have the excuse that patient do not send regular updates etc, but you guys tell me...what patient will not send their final pictures to the clinic to get an asessment even more when the procedure does not give the optimum result? I find it hard to buy into these clinics excuse...

 

Hence, to me posting these home run results that may be aided by meds, patient characteristics etc is no less than deceptive advertising!!!

 

If anybody else has any comment, please feel free to add

I've said this before, and I'll repeat it again: hair in itself is completely meaningless! What causes the problem for all of us is that the loss of facial framing RADICALLY alters your appearence, and makes you look OLDER !!! For those rare few individuals where going bald doesn't make them look any older, then MPB is not a problem. However, it may become a problem as they age and the "shaved head" look suddenly doesn't look as good anymore.

I am a very health conscious, holistic, and spiritual person; so I have never bothered hanging around with what I would consider the "superficial" crowd. In my 20s and early 30s I used to think anybody who worried about hairloss was superficial and not spiritually connected. Then, in my late 30s I started to realize that even the people (women especially) whom I considered to be "on my level" and not the superficial type still possessed the inclination to stereotype people based upon their hairloss. Most people are completely unaware that MPB has nothing to do with a lack of health; they actually are under the assumption that balding people should be taking better care of themselves, and then they would grow their hair back.

Once I realized this it became unequivocally clear that even those people who are not superficial and on my level will unconsciously discriminate against those of us with MPB, without even realizing it! If a woman thinks you must be eating bad and not taking care of your health because of your thinning hair, she will be less attracted to you -- NOT because of the hairloss, but because she thinks you are not health conscious and she wants to be with a man who is !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It's a vicious circle of unfair discrimination, and it's therefore no suprise that many of us are willing to pay thousands of dollars for a HT to overcome it!

I agree with TC17. You are WAY too young to even be thinking about a HT !!!

I think in about 3-5 years time we are going to see alot of 25-30 year old patients coming back to this forum and bashing HTs as the worst thing they ever did in their life. These will be the patients who "lowered their hairlines" when they were just beginning to recede at age 20-23, and they will have a barren wasteland of bald skin behind an expensive mustache they paid thousands of dollars for up front -- and will hence look like FREAKS !!! It's happened many times before, and it's happening again. :mad:

And most will not remember that they were forewarned by the more wise members of this forum.

Consult with Dr. Feller. He is in New York and gets excellent reviews on here, and his prices are very reasonable.

 

For 6 years of hair loss, you still have a pretty strong forelock and crown. If Propecia is maintaining, you could get a small procedure done in the hairline and have yourself in good shape in under a years time. My hair is medium/fine, but considering I've only had 1200 grafts throughout over the front half, it shows promise that another 2000 or so would give me the illusion of a full head.

RCWest,

Do you have before and after photos ?

D,

Those 2 cases are homeruns where the ball was knocked out of the park and to the moon! After 5 years of research on these boards I don't believe every patient can expect results on that level, ESPECIALLY in the 2nd link you posted!

IMO that patient 1) must have coarse shaft diameter, 2) MUST have been in the top 2% responders to finasteride, and hence alot of hair in the mid scalp and crown is regenerated native hair growing back and getting thicker, 3) must have had a higher # of 3-4 hair grafts than the average patient, so the total volume of hair may have been 10,000+ even though only 4200 grafts were listed. There's just no way IMO that all the hair coverage that patient has came strictly from 4200 grafts, and I would definitely not consider that anywhere near an "average" result for 100% growth of 4200 grafts. I could be wrong, but I think it is way, way, way above average !!

Something has to give somewhere! I think the OP could very well be experiencing the regeneration of the onset of aggressive MPB, though proscar held it in check for a little while. Look at the back of his head -- he has extremely aggressive & wide crown loss dipping way down. If proscar was working for him then by now that all would have filled in nicely. This is why I tell prospective HT patients to take proscar for at least 5 years before seeking a HT -- 10 to even be more safe!

Hair Transplant Videos hair transplant Video Page 1 - Hasson & Wong

 

 

Hair Transplant Videos hair transplant Video Page 1 - Hasson & Wong

 

 

Guys, please check out these two results from the same clinic...IMO, they have a similiar level of hair loss and no. of grafts....so what was the difference? Irrespective of that, even if the patient request for the entire head to be covered as ES seems to ask, i think it is the docs responsibility to give proper guidance and not heed in to the patients request!!!

 

The least this patient should have gotten was a full looking hairline and he did not get that..the doctor could have then gone back with whatever grafts were remaining!! I think that is the basis of any HT operation!!

K_2009,

What is your age ?

How long have you been on Proscar ?

IMO 4600 grafts for a NW6+ spread over the entire balding area looks about correct for what you have acheived. It's probably a bit less than 100% growth, but definitely not a failed transplant by any stretch. I wonder why did Wong try and cover all that area with 4600 grafts ? Did you request this ?

Bobman had a pre-HT condition similar to yours, but he opted to have 4700 grafts placed only in the front third. Then he went back for a 2nd pass to address the crown. I think his approach was the most wise.

You essentially went from a NW6+ to a diffuse thinning NW2 with "see thru" hair. That's pretty much all you can expect from 4600 grafts placed over such a large area. HT surgeons are not magicians, unfortunately.

Concerning hair shaft diameter, I actually think the best place to be is somewhere in the middle -- unless the loss is so severe and the area to cover so large that the HT will look too thin.

The problem with coarse hair (IMO) is that even the best docs cannot totally avoid the "pluggy" look upon very close inspection. So the HT may look great from a distance, but up close and running fingers thru the hair may reveal that something was done. This might be OK for some, but for me I'd have issues if a girl could "spot" something strange and unnatural.

BTW, my shaft diameter is medium fine. Had it been coarse I probably would have opted to not get a HT, mostly because I've seen a few URFUT plants with coarse hair and, though it looked great, up close I could spot it as a plant.

I was actually ALOT more concerned about this issue than I was the strip scar, because the recipient area is what everybody sees on you (up close and personal) every day -- and it CAN'T be hidden, unless you live under a hat!

So I suppose all of those older men aged 50-70 who reversed their BPH on finasteride (due to drsatic reduction of DHT in the prostate) in the Merck study were a FLUKE, right ?

That controlled study is not valid scientific information, right ?

What about the men in their late 60s who have been on 5 mg Fin for 20 years now, and whose prostate conditions have remained healthy as a direct result of Fin. ?

Oh yeah, and what about the men 40+ who have been on 1.25 mg Fin. for 15 years or more and haven't seen any further significant MPB ? The majority of the men I know in this category have had this as their experience. Are they all flukes as well ?

Swimmy,

It was my understanding from reading the Merck study that DHT is the culprit causing enlarged prostate in older men, and that finasteride therapy shrinks the prostate. But you are saying that DHT shrinks the prostate ?

Your points do not match with the long term Merck study I read on finasteride.

And I haven't yet read anywhere that testosterone causes MPB. I think it is pretty well accepted that DHT causes MPB, not testosterone.

 

As for Fin. In the early stages of MPB when your young its more DHT/Testosterone related so its very effective .However, as one gets older estrogen is the problem. That is why fin starts to lose its effectiveness. However, everyone is different and may not be as prevalent. I'm not saying it won't work. But it won't be anything like a 20 yr old who's on it.

 

 

 

Swimmy,

I'd like to see the controlled medical studies that back up what you are asserting here. Can you post some links ?

Remember, finasteride was developed for BPH which is a condition of enlarged prostate that occurs in mostly older men, ages 50-70.

Are you implying that because they are not in their 20s that finasteride will not work for them ? It takes a 5mg dose to help with BPH.

Also, I have known many men in their 20s over the years for whom propecia did not work because the MPB was too aggressive; but pretty much all the men over 35 (who were thinning, but still had some hair) I have known that started propecia had success with it.

I think you may have your facts backwards. For most all the men who progress to NW6/7, MPB is known to be the most aggressive from the early 20s til the mid 30s. After 40 the sex drive starts going down and in many men hairloss stabilizes and is not nearly as aggressive as it was in the 20s.

I do think men in their 20s have a better chance at retaining/reviving hair cells with Fin. than do older men, but ONLY because not enough time has transpired to kill the follicles. But this is not the same thing as what you are saying.

I know from my own personal experience that my MPB slowed down dramatically when I turned 30, and it came to a grinding halt once I started propecia. I've been on it for over 10 years now and have seen very little additional loss at age 41.

I actually think guys in their 20s are at much higher risk of finasteride losing it's effectiveness after 3-7 years. Everyone I've known over 40, and who have been on finasteride for over 10 years, have not had any loss of effectiveness from the drug. As a matter of fact, in these men it seems to work the best of all because they don't lose any more hair.

Michael5577,

Have you yet had a state-of-the-art megasession HT performed by one of the coalition docs recommended on this site ?

If not, then you are very green and have little knowledge of the process.

I learned more in 1 day of getting my HT than I did in 5 years of research on various forums.

A megasession URFUT HT is so complicated and labor intensive that it requires a large team of highly skilled people to pull it off. The HT surgeon is sort of like an engineer/architect, and the techs & staff are the laborers. Do you think the engineers who design F-15 fighter jets should also be the ones in the factory doing the work ?

The HT doc excises the strip, staples it closed, and then makes all of the incisions where the grafts are placed. This is ALOT of work, and if he/she also had to place all of the grafts then the chance of fatigue causing mistakes will increase exponentially.

I had techs with 10/15 years experience at implanting grafts working on me, so IMO they were highly skilled professionals. And that is ALL they do! Would you really want the same person trying to do everything in your procedure ?

You really need to do some more research my friend. It seems your friend probably went to a shady clinic. There was a clinic (somehwere in NY I believe) that was closed down years ago because they had a garbage man dissecting & placing the grafts -- the HT clinic was his night job !!!