Need a good doctor to finish what I started

[wylie]

Hello,

 

This is my first post, and I just found this forum, already I am impressed with the resources here and the information I have found. Very helpful.

 

Back from 1993 to about 1997-98 I went thru various surgeries, about 8 visits in all, all with the same doctor, and I cant say I have been pleased with the results. Coloring my hair and even having it 'spiked', somewhat, during visits to the barber have really boosted my confidence in my hair, but it still is too thin and not at all good enough for me to once again feel confident about my appearance. Deep down inside me I have thought that even baldness is preferred over how I have felt, largely, about the results of my surgeries.

 

For years I have resorted to hats for most trips outside of the house and have often found myself in avoidance of going places without a hat on. I'm sick of it, and have to change this. I cant go on like this forever.

 

Now I'm hoping to find someone who might be able to add to what is there and need a good physician who might be experienced enough to add anough grafts to make a noticable difference. My biggest concern is lack of donor sites for grafts.

 

I live in Peoria and am about 2.5 hours from Chicago and 3 hours from both St. Louis and Indy and am looking for a good referral.

 

Perhaps someone can suggest someone. Thanks

[wylie]

Hello,

 

This is my first post, and I just found this forum, already I am impressed with the resources here and the information I have found. Very helpful.

 

Back from 1993 to about 1997-98 I went thru various surgeries, about 8 visits in all, all with the same doctor, and I cant say I have been pleased with the results. Coloring my hair and even having it 'spiked', somewhat, during visits to the barber have really boosted my confidence in my hair, but it still is too thin and not at all good enough for me to once again feel confident about my appearance. Deep down inside me I have thought that even baldness is preferred over how I have felt, largely, about the results of my surgeries.

 

For years I have resorted to hats for most trips outside of the house and have often found myself in avoidance of going places without a hat on. I'm sick of it, and have to change this. I cant go on like this forever.

 

Now I'm hoping to find someone who might be able to add to what is there and need a good physician who might be experienced enough to add anough grafts to make a noticable difference. My biggest concern is lack of donor sites for grafts.

 

I live in Peoria and am about 2.5 hours from Chicago and 3 hours from both St. Louis and Indy and am looking for a good referral.

 

Perhaps someone can suggest someone. Thanks

[Bill - Seemiller]

Wylie,

 

Welcome to our community.

 

There have been several advancement in hair transplantation surgery since 1998, as you may be aware from your research.

 

A good place to start searching for doctors is our coalition doctors.

 

Though I always recommend that people don't choose a doctor based on location, we do recommend a quality doctor in your state:

 

Dr. Raymond Konior is a member of our coalition

 

Additionally, I think it's good practice to consult with at least 3 quality physicians. I recommend starting with our coalition doctors.

 

I hope this helps.

 

Bill

[the B spot]

I consulted with Dr. Konier and I believe he is doing very nice work.

 

I ended up choosing Ron Shapiro, in Minnesota.

 

It will be a 2.5 hour ride to Chi-Town and a 6.5-7.5 hour drive to Minnesota.

 

I would suggest a consult with both docs.

 

Also, as Bill suggested, choose another doc or two that catch your eye and disregard travel.

 

Please note, there are NO other docs in the Chicagoland area that come close to Dr. Konier, so please choose wisely.

 

Take Care,

J

[wylie]

Excellent, this is a good start. Thanks much for the suggestions. You can bet I will take them seriously.

 

Again, while I am not necessarily happy with my results, they also are nothing that looks necessarily terrible, either. And I also have no idea of the medical advancements made since my last procedure. I would be very happy to just fix the frontal area and hairline, and the bald spot in back I could care less about, provided the front is done to my satisfaction.

 

Again, thanks to both of you for your suggestions.

[calvinmd]

Here's some highlights of the HT advancements in the last 10-15 years in a nutshell. Hopefully it will help you begin to make sense of all the internet HT chat:

 

 

-- I don't know whether or not you've had large round "punch-grafts" taken from the back of the head in past surgeries, but that method of HT surgery is obsolete now.

 

-- "Mini-grafts" and "micro-grafts" are history even from strip-style work. It's "follicular units" now, which are grafts in 1-hair, 2-hair, and 3/4-hair chunks. Nothing bigger than 4-hair chunks is acceptable from the top doctors anymore, and the best hairlines are being done with primarily single-hair grafts all across the front where it's most visible. The results can often look almost indistinguishable from nature's hairlines even up close, if the patient has enough donor hair for it.

 

-- Donor strips have gotten larger in terms of per-session grafts. Getting 2500-3500 (follicular-unit) grafts is very normal for patients of top doctors, and a few people on earth have literally had 6-7000 grafts done in a single huge HT session. So in terms of how much hair you want to get transplanted during a single surgery, your available donor hair and financial situation are the big limitations. The only big downsides of the huge sessions are worse swelling/healing times, and longer strip-scars that often extend all the way to the ears or beyond.

 

-- FUE (Follicular unit extraction) is the "hot" new thing in the HT world right now. It basically means taking grafts from the back of your head one-at-a-time with a sort of a big needle, rather than cutting off a strip of skin & suturing-up the large wound. (Think of it as sorta like doing the old punch-graft HT work, but only using tiny needle-sized punches for getting 1-4 hairs at a time.)

 

FUE still produces scarring, but it's more like thousands of little dots all over the donor area rather than a big line-scar or the "shotgun" effect. FUE obviously heals a lot quicker too. The biggest downsides of FUE work are that you have to shave your head (almost bald) for the procedure so the surgeon can see what he's doing, and it also costs essentially double the price of strip-style HT surgery for any given number of grafts because it takes so much longer to perform than strip HTs.

 

FUE isn't really replacing strip-style HT work yet, but it still is growing in popularity all the time. Right now, many of the most extensively-transplanted HT patients are getting a combination of FUE and strip-style surgeries. They're trying to squeeze their donor areas for every last graft possible, and FUE work allows docs to raid larger areas of your head that were unreachable with the old strip-surgery & punch-grafting. The FUE docs can basically "thin" the hair over your entire donor area pretty evenly to get all their transplanting grafts, rather than pull a visible bunch hairs from any single spot in the back that has to be covered with grown-out hair hanging over it.

 

 

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[wylie]

Thanks calvin for the updates, all my grafts were the "punch style" and with all the innovations there may even be hope for me and my hairline of really looking natural. It certainly needs work on the very outer perimeter and the one and two hair grafts should work well there. As far as anything else is concerned, we will have to see I suppose.

[NervousNelly]

Wylie,

 

For what it is you need and given your location, Dr. Ron Shapiro is a short drive. I need some hairline work myself and is my priority and that is why I chose Shapiro. I am scheduled with him next week. Very few will argue that he is one of the best at hairlines.

 

 

NN

[calvinmd]

Yeah, the hairline work really will look much more natural than in the past. It's not 100% perfect (and it probably never will be), but realistically you have to be a fellow HT guy to spot many of the hairlines being done by the top doctors nowadays. The "pluggy" look of a lot of older transplants are simply not what you get from the better doctors anymore. Everyday people off the street simply won't know the difference. (I remember there was a recent case of a guy on one of the hair loss message boards with a transplanted hairline, and he actually got hired to model shampoo for a small photoshoot. The newer HT hairlines can be THAT good.)

 

 

The limited supply of donor hair is still the deal-breaker. The current HT doctors can do work that looks pretty amazing compared to 15 years ago. Their work would functionally "cure" baldness for most of us if they weren't limited by that. (And the growing & selling of cloned/multiplied hair follicles for baldness is showing signs of being a reality within another 10-15 years, so even that may change.)

 

For a lot of reasons this is a MUCH better time to be fighting baldness than in the early 1990s.

 

 

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[wylie]

Originally posted by NervousNelly:

Wylie,

 

For what it is you need and given your location, Dr. Ron Shapiro is a short drive. I need some hairline work myself and is my priority and that is why I chose Shapiro. I am scheduled with him next week. Very few will argue that he is one of the best at hairlines.

 

 

NN

 

Thats good to hear. I spoke with his office manager (Tom) last night who told me about his expertise at "fixing" others work. This is great to hear. And the work I had done was not terrible, in fact, its really not bad at all, but too thin to keep concealed under bright lights. (A pale complexion, darker hair and very thin, straight hair all conspire against me.. )

 

With that said, I'm very much looking forward to seeing him, and the earliest I can get in to see him is over 6 weeks. But I'll be there.

[wylie]

Originally posted by calvinmd:

The limited supply of donor hair is still the deal-breaker. The current HT doctors can do work that looks pretty amazing compared to 15 years ago. ---------

 

I agree, especially after looking at the pictures on this site. It's too bad I opted for this in my 20's and not my 40's. However, my original physician did say there were donor areas left so hopefully that means there is enough to fix this, or at least make a substantial improvement, which would be fantastic.

[Janna]

Wylie,

 

I need clarification - Did you talk to someone at Dr. Konior's or Dr. Ron Shapiro's office? Cuz we don't have a Tom working at our clinic and you should be able to see Dr. Shapiro sooner than 6 weeks. Sorry, I'm confused by your reply to Nervous Nelly two posts above.

[wylie]

Originally posted by Janna:

Wylie,

 

I need clarification - Did you talk to someone at Dr. Konior's or Dr. Ron Shapiro's office? Cuz we don't have a Tom working at our clinic and you should be able to see Dr. Shapiro sooner than 6 weeks. Sorry, I'm confused by your reply to Nervous Nelly two posts above.

 

I did speak with someone from Dr. Konior's office. He told me that the Dr. himself would speak with me and that he specialized in this type of surgery (I believe the term would be 'repair', although this was not spoken as such during the conversation, but rather it was what I was asking for) and without putting words in his mouth (I dont remember the exact conversation) he sounded professional and helpful and told me that the Dr would evaluate and first see if this was possible based on my present state. I'm guardedly optimistic at this point.

 

As far as the appointment, he scheduled me for around mid September for an eval. If the Doctor is that booked, then hes that booked. I'm not surprised, and am looking forward to speaking with him.

 

However, thanks for the comments. I'm glad, very glad, to hear from others on this forum and their positive reviews.